Marguerite Gordon Brown

Marguerite G. Brown, born July 22, 1913 in Garrison, Iowa, passed away April 26, 2013 of natural causes.

Teacher, assistant girl's basketball coach going to State Championship in 1933, wife of a college dean and diplomat, author, college administrator, loan officer, bank manager and bank Vice President, sheriff's department volunteer, artist, loving wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and friend are just a few of the many hats that Marguerite Virginia Gordon Koenig Brown wore over the past 99+ years.

Marguerite was the youngest of three children and in 1930 graduated from Iowa State Teacher's College beginning her career as a Kindergarten teacher.

After her marriage to Myron Koenig, a college professor, they moved to Washington, D.C. where she wrote articles, illustrated a children's book and ran a private nursery school.

In the mid 50s, she moved to California from Virginia, where she and her sister opened 'The Little Red School House' giving painting and ceramic classes. The shop was closed due to a fire and she subsequently became the Registrar at Woodbury College in Los Angeles.

To be closer to home, she took a job handling safety deposit boxes and the mail at Security Bank in Pasadena. In 1961, she married Walter Brown and switched to First City Bank in Rosemead, where her banking career continued to rise until the bank was sold in 1981. Persuaded by banking customers and friends, Marguerite, along with Bill O'Mara and a few other friends from First City Bank, raised over $4.5 million in capital to open their own independent First American Bank in Rosemead in 1982 - all of this at the age of 69 when most people are ready to retire. When she did retire at age 84 in 1997, she was Senior Vice President and Director.

After retiring, Marguerite volunteered at the Temple City Sheriff's Department for several years and remained very active with both of her passions: the Arcadia Bridge Center, where she played for over 25 years, and her beloved watercolor painting, which she took up at the age of 84, continuing both until her death.

Marguerite was an amazing woman and inspiration to all who knew her. May her heart and soul know the impact her life had in opening doors to lead the way for others, with all the satisfaction that comes with having had a life so well lived. She was a shining example of how to lead a meaningful life and how to age with beauty and grace and she will be sorely missed.

She is survived by her twin daughters, Anne Koenig and Barbara Beekman (husband, Bill), two grandchildren, Jennifer Butler (husband, John), and Lisa Dornblaser (husband, Joe), and three great-grandchildren, Jordan & Cameron Dornblaser and Audrey Butler.

A memorial service has been tentatively scheduled for May 19, 2013 at 7:00 PM at the Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.