Marjorie M. Emery
Marjorie Melzar Emery died on August 21, 2017, at her home in Wayne, Maine.
She was the loving wife of Francis Talbot Emery for 57 years, who predeceased her in 1991. Marjorie had recently celebrated her 100th birthday with many members of her family .
She was born on August 6, 1917, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. At a very young age she began taking piano lessons and ultimately organ lessons. Playing the organ was her true passion for all her life. Even at the age of 99 last summer she gave an organ concert in Wayne.
After graduating as valedictorian at the age of 16 from Wilmington High School in Massachusetts, her love of music led her to study at the New England Conservatory in Boston. When she was just 18 she served her first church in her hometown of Wilmington as both organist and choir director. For nearly eight decades she has been an organist and or choir director at the churches of several communities in Massachusetts and Maine. She played the organ and directed choirs in other towns of Massachusetts namely Woburn, Andover, Stoneham, and Wakefield. After moving to Boothbay Harbor, Maine, she was the organist at the Christian Science Church, the Ocean Point Chapel, and at the Southport United Methodist Church. During her 11 years at the Southport Methodist Church, she was both choir director and organist. In later years, she was the organist and choir director for several years for the Wayne Community Church in Wayne. Marjorie considered her years playing the organ as a great joy in her life and despite her failing health played the organ in her home in Wayne until almost 100 years of age.
Marjorie was a member of the American Guild of Organists. She was past matron, organist, and a lifelong member of the Acacia Chapter, order of the Eastern Star. She was also a member of Chapter G of PEO. Marjorie was past president and treasurer of the Wayne Friday Club and served on multiple church committees over the years. She taught both piano and organ to countless individuals. She enjoyed many interests but family, music, church, and books were constant. Her knowledge of the bible was extraordinary. As a voracious reader, she often read two or more novels each week well into her last years. She also loved dogs and for many years raised golden retrievers. A love of the sea evolved when she spent her summers as a youth at a saltwater farm in Edgecomb, Maine. Marjorie and her husband, Talbot, retired in 1976 to their seaside home in Boothbay Harbor. After her husband’s death in 1991, she moved to Wayne to be closer to family.
Marjorie was the daughter of Edna Frances McKusick and Harold Eber Melzar. She was predeceased by her brothers, Frederick Preston Melzar and Elliot Parker Melzar and sister, Elizabeth Pullen. Marjorie was also predeceased by her daughter, Eugenia White. Marjorie leaves two daughters, Madaline Frances Syvertson and her husband Roy of South Hampton, New Hampshire, Rebecca Emery Biggar and her dear friend Paul Golden of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, and her son Peter Talbot Emery and his wife, Deborah Foss Emery of Wayne. She also leaves her sister Eugenia Shepard of Boothbay Harbor, and sister-in-law Jean Melzar of Boxford, Massachusetts. Marjorie had 12 grandchildren, 16 great -grandchildren, nine great-great-grandchildren, and numerous nieces and nephews.
A family graveside service will be held in the Evergreen Cemetery in Boothbay on Friday, Aug. 25, the date of her beloved husband Talbot’s birthday. She will be laid to rest beside him. The service will be officiated by her niece, the Reverend Virginia Rickerman. A memorial service will held at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 26, at the Wayne Community Church in Wayne.
In lieu of flowers, memorial remembrances for Marjorie may be sent to the Southport United Methodist Church, 372 Hendricks Hill Road, Southport, ME 04576 or to the Wayne Community Church, 22 Old Winthrop Road, Wayne, ME 04284.
