Carolyn Elizabeth Tonic was born on pril 16, 1942 in Passaic, NJ to Charles and Helen Tonic. She was raised in Bloomfield NJ, where she received a formal education along side her five brothers – Charles Jr., Donald, Roger, Kenneth, and Norman Tonic. Her first knowledge of self came by way of a singing group named, “The Flexitones”, a 60’s styles “girl group” co-founded by Carolyn during her teenaged years at Bloomfield Senior High School. It wasn’t long before the glamor of New York City and the renown halls of the Ophelia Devore School of Charm, a finishing school for African American women, set the pace for future endeavors. At Devore, Cecily Tyson, the acclaimed actress, was Carolyn’s speech instructor. Grace Del Marco Modeling Agency, one of the first in the United States took notice thereafter and chose to exhibit Carolyn’s unique blend of prescence, poise, and wit on stage as a model at the Ed Sullivan Theater during the 1970’s. However a marriage
with little children made it necessary to balance ever growing personal endeavors.
Carolyn decided to refocus her energy in other areas closer to home. In true trail-blazer style, she founded “Essence”; an all female, African American softball team which placed in the top regionally in the northern NJ area. She began to design clothes and dress local talent while creating her own sewing patterns. She became politically active in the Bloomfield community where she resided by helping to organize the Neighborhood Development Association, all while leading her three children, Dale, Leslie and Shawn into college. Carolyn also set personal goals in academia and earned a Bachelors degree in Fine Arts from the Montclair State University. She would go on to become a certified teacher of the disabled as well as a Substance Abuse Counselor. The draw of the stage was never lost by her though. Throughout the decade of the 1980’s, Carolyn’s wit and charm filled the radio airwaves as an on-air radio personality over WNJR -AM in the New York Metropolitan area.

She was the Co-founder and Co-host of the provocative GOSPELTAIMENT & THE ARTS talk-radio show, interviewing such luminaries as the late Queen Mother Moore, an American Civil Rights leader and black Nationalist.  Carolyn gravitated toward regional theater also, earning wide acclaim in northern New Jersey stage productions as a speaker and performer.
With her children firmly nestled in their own careers, Carolyn relocated to the Philadelphia area where she again landed her own talk based radio program on air at WTTM -AM, WIMG - AM and WTSR -AM radio stations in the Ewing, NJ, Trenton, NJ and the greater Delaware Valley programming market. She was promoted to Guidance Counselor at the Columbus School in Trenton, NJ where she would eventually retire; but not before earning a US patent for instructional devices, designed to assist mentally and physically challenged Elementary school students. Carolyn was also modeling again. But as an exclusive model of African fashion for Trenton, NJ-based Kum-Ba-Ya, a retailer specializing in unique African couture. She became a master puppet maker, a copyrighted lyricist, and an esteemed member of the Garden State Storytelling League and the National Association of Black Storytellers, where she would bring fictional stories from the African Continent to the stage along with a family of handmade puppets.
Carolyn Elizabeth Tonic – Robinson passed away on April 26, 2025, and is survived by her three children, Dale Robinson, Leslie Robinson-Wapples and Shawn Robinson-Graham, six grandchildren: Donovan Robinson, Dr. Brianna Wapples–Mwangi, Vanessa Wapples, Bryan Graham and Olyvia Graham, five great grand children: Indigo Robinson, Juniper Robinson, Urielle Robinson, Neveah Robinson, Joyelle Mwangi, Carolyns’ two surviving brothers, Kenneth and Norman Tonic, Godsister Renee (Cookie) Franklin, Charesse, and Shantae.