Marjorie Ann Brown's Obituary
Marjorie Miller Brown departed this life on Feb. 14, 2017, at the age of 95. She was born October 12, 1921, the only child of Adelbert and Marguerite Miller of Grand Rapids, MI. After graduating from Northwestern University in 1942, she worked at 5th Army Headquarters in Chicago, where she met and married an Army Air Corps pilot, Robert W. Durham. She and her husband spent the war years at various airfields around the Southeast Flying Training Command, where Durham was a pilot instructor. Their union produced a son, Roger Durham, but the marriage did not long outlast the end of the war; the couple divorced in 1947, and Marjorie returned to her parents’ home in Chicago. In the 1950s Marjorie held several different positions in the advertising and public relations field, working for the Northern Trust Co., the Canadian Consulate, and Continental Casualty Insurance. At Continental Casualty she met the love of her life, Edward E. Brown, an SMU graduate from Bells, TX; they were married in 1957 and settled in San Antonio, later moving to Houston, where Ed attended night classes at South Texas College of Law. In 1963, Marjorie and Ed relocated to Dallas, where Ed began his law practice in partnership with his former law school classmate, the late Filemon Valdez, while Marjorie continued her career as an advertising copywriter, working for several of the city’s most prominent agencies. In Dallas, Marjorie and her husband were involved in various community activities, including as a host family for what was then called the Dallas Committee on Foreign Visitors and for SMU Law School’s summer institutes for foreign lawyers and judges. After her retirement in 1986, Marjorie began to volunteer at the Park Forest Branch of the Dallas Public Library, a commitment that continued for more than 20 years. She lost her husband to cancer in 1988 and was also predeceased by two step-sons, Robert L. Brown and Gary Brown, both of Arlington. In addition to her son Roger and his wife Leslie, Marjorie is survived by a step-son, Mark Brown of Huntington Beach, CA. A memorial service will be held at 11:00 AM, Saturday, February 25, 2017, at St. James’ Episcopal Church, 9845 McCree Road, Dallas, TX 75238. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the Dallas Public Library.
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