Margery Thomas Morrison was born on March 27th, 1924 in Long Beach, California, the treasured daughter of Osie and Harriet Thomas. She grew up surrounded by the scent of orange groves in San Marino, California. She learned to love film with her parents, and spent summers on Catalina and Balboa Islands where she danced to the music of Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, and Tommy Dorsey & Frank Sinatra.
In 1942, Margery set off for Stanford University, where she pledged Tri-Delt. Ben Morrison saw her picture in the Freshman Yearbook and knew she was the one. They were married in San Gabriel, and she left Stanford in 1944 for Oklahoma where Ben was stationed as an Army Air Corps Flight Instructor. As she would tell her grandson, James, “Things were different in those days; there was a war on.”
After World War II, Margery and Ben settled in Aberdeen, which she adopted as her “home town,” and where she would live the rest of her life. She and Ben raised their family in the vibrant days of the logging industry on Grays Harbor. Margery shared with her family her love of travel, the culinary arts, and literature. She enjoyed her many friendships on the Harbor, many of which were formed in PEO, Review Club, Bridge Club and at St. Andrews Episcopal Church. She was active in the community in Aberdeen, enthusiastically supporting the library, annotating books and helping to create an art print lending library. She always kept a book by her side.
Margery and Ben always enjoyed visits from their children and traveled to see them in cities all over the world. Margery especially loved spending time with her grandchildren. Together they explored the West Coast from Vancouver Island to Southern California. A blackberry pie always greeted her grandchildren when they arrived for a visit.
Margery was known for her caring, gracious manner and wonderful sense of humor. A person of elegance and poise, she was stoic in the face of life’s challenges, measured and resolute in bearing, unboundedly warm and giving in love. She shined everywhere she went, but suffused her light throughout the room, illuminating friends and family and strangers.
Margery is survived by her daughters, Kathryn and Kerry, and her grandsons, Rolf, Gregory, and James. Donations in memory of Margery can be made to The Pancreatic Cancer Action Network in honor of her beloved son, Christopher.
