KENMORE, N.Y. — The passing of Queen Elizabeth II means even more for some people who took up the hobby of "Royal Watcher," and that includes a woman from Kenmore.
2 On Your Side spent some time with Angela Berti, who makes Buckingham Palace her focal point during her trips to England.
Maybe it's the small but prominent Union Jack placed amidst the landscaping. Perhaps it's a royal decree of sorts to enter the personalized memorabilia Kenmore kingdom of Angela Berti.
An English-born and accented pre-K teacher caught Angela's attention as a kid, and that lit the royal fuse to start to acquire all things England with a crowning touch. That would be her keepsakes and even personal photographs of the queen with that famous white gloved wave and her family at the Palace from the April 2011 wedding of Prince William and Catherine, who is also known as Kate Middleton.
"We were a little bit further away, but we saw her (Queen Elizabeth) drive in, in her limousine," Berti said. "We saw all of the family drive in through the gates from afar, and then they all came out onto the balcony together once they had all assembled after the ceremonies. Yeah, it was cool. She was there, and Prince Phillip was there. The whole gang."
The royal gang is now without one particular person as Berti notes of the past Queen.
"She was a steadfast force for 70 years in the public eye and for people, that's all we know in England is Queen Elizabeth," Berti said.
Actually, Princess Elizabeth, in her 20s at the time, visited Niagara Falls in 1951, as we have seen in photos provided through the Twitter account of Mayor Jim Diodati and the Niagara Falls, Ontario Public Library.
The then-young woman is seen in one of those pictures departing by train as she was joined by her husband, Prince Phillip, who just died last year.
She ascended to the throne with the death of her father, and now there's going to be King Charles.
"I hope to a certain extent that he starts to look at ways to modernize the royal family, to sort of break down some of the things we've been hearing over the last year, whether or not all that stuff is true," Berti said. "I'm hoping that he can break down those barriers that seem to be surrounding them. I know he's a very avid environmentalist, so I'm certain a lot of that will come into play."
Berti recalls first visiting Buckingham Palace during her years as a college student, and even with her fascination as a follower of the royal family, she realized it wasn't for everyone in England.
"I lived with a family while there, and they were not enamored with the royal family, and I think you'll find a lot of British folks are not," Berti said. "You know there's pros and cons just like here.
"But I look at them as almost a tourism asset. People go there and they go to Buckingham Palace because that's what you do when you go to London. But for me going there and seeing it was like, 'Oh my goodness, this is what I looked at for years,' and then seeing them around it was exciting. It would be like seeing a presidential motorcade or, you know, the Bills coming home from a win. You know, like those kinds of things. That's how I looked at it when I was there."
Still, Angela's admiration for the queen endures.
"To think of the burden that she put on her shoulders at such a young age and carried on for 70 years without fail," Berti said.