Mary Haight

September 17, 1936 - November 5, 2022

Mary Fromholz Haight died peacefully on November 5, 2022 at Foxdale Village, bringing to an end a rich, full life of arts, adventure, and beloved friends and family.

Born Mary Therese Fromholz on September 17th, 1936 to A. Stanley Fromholz and Therese Veronica Fromholz, née Haley, at the French Hospital in New York City, Mary grew up in Darien, CT where she developed her lifelong love for art, reading, horseback riding, and sailing, solo skippering her Dyer dinghy on Long Island Sound. After graduating from Darien High School, Mary moved on to Middlebury College where she earned a degree in American literature.

After working a variety of jobs in New York City, Mary was hired as an assistant to George Wein, founder of the Newport Jazz and Folk Festivals. The job allowed her to travel and enjoy a wealth of live music. It also put her at the center of the 60s music scene, introducing her to such luminaries as the Seegers, Duke Ellington, and Maria Muldaur, as well as her first husband, bluegrass music collector and broadcaster Bill Vernon. When Bob Dylan went electric at Newport, Mary was watching from the wings.

Mary's love of adventures and meeting new people inspired a lifetime of travel. In her college years she drove around the country with three other Middlebury women, sleeping in campsites, parks, and motels and, for a time, working in a California mothball factory to earn enough to get home. Her love of wandering was matched by that of her second husband Frank A. Haight. With him she explored every continent except Antarctica, in the early days traveling by ship. She lived in New Zealand, France, and the Netherlands, traveling behind the Iron Curtain, across South Africa, and to the islands of Micronesia, even with small children in tow. Mary like to say that, with an infant, you have to pack as much stuff to go to the grocery store as to go to Poland... so you might as well go to Poland.

While Mary worked a broad range of jobs in her early years, all of them eventually came to involve some copy writing, proofreading, or editing. After parting from Frank, and by then living in State College, PA, Mary earned a master's degree in technical editing and journal production from Penn State University. In 1982 she was hired as the first managing editor of the academic business journal Interfaces. As her master's project, she designed a new cover and layout for the journal and wrote its style manual. She remained managing editor for twenty years. One of the journal's editors in chief later described her as "a delight and a terror to work with." She rigorously maintained high editorial standards and became famous in the field for her meticulous editing and extensive comments, which offered information, humor, and occasional linguistic indignation. She also edited Production and Operations Management for its first ten years, making critical contributions to POM's success as a top journal in the field. After 'retiring' she continued to edit avidly for friends, enjoying the opportunity to learn from their writing.

Mary's busy life in State College included attending Friends Meeting, membership with the Art Alliance and Bellefonte Art Museum, decades of yoga at the Center for Wellbeing, concerts at the Acoustic Brew and elsewhere, and beloved writing and book groups. She continued to be an active artist, ranging between pottery, drawing, painting, and creation with found objects. Her home studio included a drawer labeled "possible future recycled art." With her many wonderful friends she took classes, attended lectures and openings, went to films, and explored rural Pennsylvania. Every summer, she migrated to Chatham, MA, where, with treasured beach friends, she sailed, fished, swam, walked and, with evident bliss, devoured the local seafood. She often said that she loved sailing "because it's magic." Confronted with the contradictory view that sailing was, in fact, physics, she replied, "Yes, exactly!"

Mary will be sorely missed by her colleagues, friends, family, and community, who will long remember her great generosity, attentive artistic eye, love of learning, wonderful stories, and irrepressible humor.

Mary is survived by her brother, Haley James Fromholz, of Pasadena, CA, along with his wife, Anita, two daughters, and granddaughter, and by her daughter Molly Irene Haight and son, Julian Arthur Haight, along with his wife Robin and two children, Stella Jane Haight and Felix Avery Haight. She is also survived by her stepson and kindred spirit Toby Haight Hollander, along with his wife, Lucky, three daughters, and grandson.

A memorial celebration of Mary's life will be held at 3:30pm on January 15th, 2023, at the State College Friends' Meetinghouse. Condolences may be sent to PO Box 1061, State College, PA, 16804 or through this website. Memorial donations may be made to:

• American Association of University Women (AAUW)
• The Art Alliance of Central Pennsylvania
• The Chatham Conservation Foundation
• The State College Food Bank.