Marjorie Ann Moore was not affiliated with this website for Wildwood in any way. She was my friend and so I have dedicated this page from my church website to her memory. Please send directly to me your own remembrances of her. My time with her was limited to particular years. Your remembrances will fill the other years. Please include your name, city and state, and how you knew her. I will post them here. Her Physical Therapy students were extremely important to her. I gave up on the guestbook page, so please email me your remembrances to honestelectionscow@gmail.com.

Marjorie was a friend to many people, a professor of anatomy and neurophysiology at  the College of St. Catherine's in the Physical Therapy Department in Minneapolis MN,  and a relative of many in the Seattle region and in the St. Paul region. Her husband Bob Block died in 2001, and Marjorie was still grieving his death at the time of her own death. She missed and loved him intensely. You may be interested in reading what Marjorie wrote about Bob about half way down Bob's webpage. I believe her tribute to him reflects the kind of person she is and how she valued another person in her life as friend, lover, and spouse. She also wrote well a picture of their life together.

Marjorie and Bob in Columbus visiting Bob's sister Jean Block and Jean's partner Nancy, in 1993.



Marjorie was a breast cancer (metatasized to bones) survivor for over four years, gamely undergoing chemo and radiation and every treatment the U of MN could offer, until the disease finally took her from us. She basically lived alone after Bob died and faced the disease alone, but not quite (!) because she was a member of support groups, both for her grief over losing Bob and for people with cancer. She also had a few dedicated former students, such as Kirsten Yokum  and a security guard at St. Kate's, Michael who kept tabs on her and helped get her groceries and take care of Bob's books and other possessions and needs. Others in support groups for cancer or grief support for her loss of Bob, also were her "angels."

(below) Kirsten Yokum, former PT student and good friend to Marjorie, has held yard sales for several years in Marjorie's honor with all proceeds going to breast cancer research. We gave her some of the best items from the house that no one claimed. In this photo, Marjorie had cut her long dark hair due to chemo effects, but she still has her intense blue eyes and mischievous smile in this photo the last year of her life.
Michael Chaney, a security guard at St. Kate's and a good friend, helped greatly in cleaning out Marjorie's house. He had stayed at her house to make sure she was ok, drive her for groceries, make some repairs, and just be there for her.

Since Marjorie knew she was dying and had a timetable from the doctors (though she consistently beat the odds, perhaps due to her biking and minimalist eating habits!), she very tediously and thoroughly went through all her possessions and gave them to people in her life she felt would appreciate them. Up to even the last month of her life in Hospice Care in Columbus, OH with her sister in law, Jean Block, Marjorie was dictating lists of who was to get what. When I went to Marjorie's house after she died to assist Jean in clearing our her house, I had  a list of recipients of many many things, from book and record collections to small gifts she had saved for years and who was to get them. There were also notes on certain items saying who was the recipient.

I am continuing this page over the next weeks. I miss Marjorie very much and know many of you reading this do also. She was very special to me.

Here are more photos. I have even more to post as I get my software updated. If you have others in electronic form, please send them.


                                                                   age three



  Marjorie went to many many conferences in Europe, and never missed the opportunity to see the sights, take copious photos, and catalog them all when she returned stateside.  Here she is shagging foul balls in the game of "hurling" in Ireland on a vacation tour she took in between chemo treatments.  Her real sports were bike-riding --mainly as transportation since neither she nor Bob owned a car, walking, and hiking wherever there were  mountains. She also folk-danced in Iowa City, where she met Bob, and of course ballet danced as a young adult. Her knit hat covered her sparse hair the last year of her life.

She returned to  Iowa  for a memorial service Bob's Iowan and college friends had for him. Marjorie was given this frog since Bob had a  massive frog collection--plush, ceramic, plastic, and  you-name-it. Marjorie continued to maintain the frog collection on the stairs leading to the second floor and in Bob's study in their house till she died.


 A  documentary calendar was done as she was receiving chemo, on chemo patients. She rode the bus to her numerous medical appointments, and a few support groups, all over St Paul and Minneapolis. Or she biked or walked.

Three friends: Kirsten, a Physical Therapist and former student of Marjorie's, and Dr.Jean Omandt, a biology and anatomy professor at the U of Minnesota and St Catherine's, whom Marjorie knew both professionally and as a great friend. (scroll beyond the white space below)
The ten year old, brilliant academically and in her biology and science drawings (we have some we'll try to post later), so full of  promise, love and  passion for life and those she touched.

Marjorie loved her parents, Howard, a railroad executive  and her mother, Polly, a gracious woman who was active in her Methodist church women's group and was a gifted cook and home entertainer. I, Marj, often benefited from her dinner parties in their home in Edmonds, Washington. Her parents preceded her in death. She also has a brother Jim, whose family she loved visiting at Christmastime in Seattle. She often spoke fondly of Jim's and his wife's young daughter and son.  (keep scrolling beyond the white space below)


Marjorie loved hiking in the mountains of Washington state, especially the North Cascades. Her family hiked together, and later we went on a few backpacking trips when I knew her in the 1970's at the University of Washington, where she got her Master's Degree. This is a more recent photo when she returned to visit family in WA.

                                                              
                         

Marjorie took ballet lessons and danced from girlhood to college. She was very excited when her company performed "on the road," as evidenced from letters she wrote to childhood friends. This photo is from high school days. Marjorie is the one with perfect form in the center.
She remained an avid ballet and ice skating fan throughout her life and never missed ice skating in the Olympics. She did research and presented papers for Dance Medicine Conferences for years.
                        


Marjorie always said she was from another century.
She and Bob attended "Madrigal Dinners" yearly while
at the U of Iowa. She played a folk harp.
She was also an accomplished pianist and could have also chosen concert piano as a career no doubt. Since Bob wrote musical scores and concertos for various instruments, their classical music collection was huge and brought them much joy. Marjorie also loved folk music-- from Celtic harp to Judy Collins and other 70's singers--as well as Broadway musicals, ballet music-- especially the romantic composers-- and anything sweet and melodious!

    More photos coming, please come back!    


Here is what a professional associate in Lucern,Switzerland, Ursula Guekos-Thoni, whom Marjorie visited, had to say about her:


This is to express our deepest sympathy to all of you and to the family of Marjorie's brother.
(I am afraid, I have got neither an email nor a mail address of Marjorie's brother, otherwise I would try to contact him as well).

Thank you for patiently informing us on Marjorie's gradual farewell.
I admire you immensely for sending M.M.'s updates over a period of sixteen long days while at the same time you looked after and cared for our late friend. Your generous updates felt like an invitation to  being there with you and  to sharing your intimacy with dear Marjorie. Thank you so much for that!

Marjorie meant a lot to me and my family and will, of course, continue to do so.

I never heard her say anything unpleasant about anybody nor did I ever hear her express
bitterness about her illness. She was invariably full of praise for her oncologist who helped her to keep going as long as possible and apparently treated her with kindness, empathy and respect.

I love to read  Marjorie's papers (those, I was able to put my hands on). They are beautifully laid out, very articulate, precise and to the point, the hallmark of a fine brain with a self imposed discipline of thinking.

I liked the way she smiled rather than laughed at little things that went wrong. We found her passion for taking pictures (and notes!) wherever she went most endearing. How did she ever manage to sort them out, I wonder.
I quite agree, dear Jean, would it not be most gratifying if somebody who knew Marjorie well took over her house and lived there.....

I am glad to hear that you do not intend to publish an obituary. Hopefully, this will prevent burglaries. Marjorie appeared to be such an orderly and careful person.The very thought that criminals might break into her home and that cherished belongings were to fall into the hands of greedy people incapable of appreciating them is devastating.

It does not seem surprising that Marjorie though in a very fragile state when arriving at your home, was armed with a long carefully planned list that gave instructions as to what item of hers ought to go to whom. This seems totally in keeping with her character: self effacing for one thing perceptive and caring for another.
Whenever she spoke of her future she expressed concern about the fact that she might not have enough time left to properly clear up and sort out all her stuff. She had obviously planned to make things as easy as possible for those who were to look after her property once she would be gone but realized that time was running out

Marjorie showed relief and satisfaction, almost exuberance, when she heard that her job will go to a capable young person who will gain on two levels at a time,  for one thing job satisfaction, for another safety, a single parent with twin infants to raise.
Marjorie was indeed very generous at heart, even at a time when ill-fated people often
become resentful of their healthy fellow men....

I hope that you, all of you, who spent the better part of the last three weeks at Marjorie's side will try to have a break, ie, to take some time off in the not too distant future.
After a period of anxiety, physical and mental exhaustion this is compulsory.

Thank you again for looking so well after our late friend. It is because of your support and comfort right up to the very end that Marjorie could leave peacefully.

Yours

Ursula and family.  


Other friends of Marjorie, please send me your thoughts and remembrances. E-photos welcome.