Joanne Marie Magruder

Joanne Marie Magruder, daughter of Gene Alvah and Lillian Ann (Jensen) Condra was born February 25, 1943 in Long Beach, California.  She died October 25, 2016, following a stroke in Berkeley, California.  She was buried in a green burial at Fernwood Cemetery in Mill Valley.

Joanne, the oldest of five children, grew up on a small farm in Anaheim, California.  She attended Whittier College on a music scholarship, earning a BA in Spanish. Joanne met the love of her life, John Joseph “Joe” Magruder, in the Methodist Wesley Fellowship at Whittier. They married on January 30, 1965 at Orangethorpe Methodist Church in Fullerton, CA. They had three children: Marie, Carl, and Ann.

When the children were young, the family enjoyed weekend camping trips, hiking in Muir Woods, the Marin Headlands or Stinson Beach.  She was active all her life, despite a bad hip in later years.  If a campout turned soggy, mosquitos attacked, or a car broke down, Joanne was quick to declare, “Well, kids, we’re having an ADVENTURE!”  This tendency to look on the bright side was an enduring aspect of her personality.  

Joanne was open and curious about people of different cultures. She grew up in an area with a large Latino population, and became fluent in Spanish at Whittier.  During her college years, she spent a summer in Guatemala with the American Friends Service Committee.  Joanne and Joe also participated in Methodist Church work projects in Mexico. In recent years, she studied and wrote about white privilege, continuing to gain a deeper understanding of culture, power and her own social location. 

Joanne was an educator.  She taught piano, briefly taught elementary school Spanish, and, after earning an MA in English, taught English as a second language part-time at Sacramento State University and Sacramento City College for twenty years. 

Joanne became a member of Whitleaf Meeting in 1966, transferred to Marin and later Sacramento Friends Meetings.  She resigned her membership in Sacramento Meeting when she left her family in the early ‘80’s and began studying with a pseudo-Buddhist who preached extreme detachment.   After her children left for college, she followed her “teacher’s” instruction and broke all family ties, intending to translate Chinese Buddhist texts.  This quickly became an exploitative relationship.  She spent most of her waking hours working without pay in the convenience store that supported the cult.  While working in the store she observed human behavior, taking notes about her experiences on scraps of paper, which she kept.

After almost twenty years she had the courage to contact her children and move out of the communal house to live on her own.  Sacramento Friends helped her build a bridge out of the situation in which she had become trapped.   She later referred to this time as “my mistake,” though she did form a lasting friendship with Yan, the wife of her “teacher,” and Yan’s children, Leo and Anci.

Following many visits and conversations, she returned to the Magruder fold.  She joined Berkeley Meeting by Convincement on January 8, 2012.  Joe and Joanne were married a second time on March 4, 2012 at Berkeley Friends Meeting.  Joanne served on several committees including Outreach and Nurture, Library, Visiting and Property.  She attended the Meeting’s reading group and Friends General Conference.

Upon her return to her family, she became an active participant in the lives of her five grandchildren, making keen observations about their likes, dislikes, and gifts. She enjoyed remotely working with Douglas on his school papers, attending “Grandfriends Day” at the San Francisco Friends School with Imani and Roden, and weekly babysitting for infant Embla so Ann could return to work.

Joanne loved projects, sewing and refinishing furniture to create a comfortable home.  She loved time in the yard, especially tending her oft-admired roses. She had her old Steinway  -- kept by Joe for the years of her absence -- restored, and continued her love of the piano.

Joanne used memoir writing to better understand herself and her life path, working with several professional writers over the years.  Her writings were partly based on notes she had taken observing people while working in the store of the community where she had lived.  In addition to writing, she enjoyed her book group, international travel, yoga, the Franciscan affinity group, visits with her siblings, riding her old three speed bicycle.  

Across her life, Joanne sought to understand how we can relate to one another.  In the last years of her life she found ways to love and support those around her and to recognize that she mattered.

She is survived by her children Marie Schonholtz, Carl Magruder and Ann Oldervoll; grandchildren Douglas Schonholtz, Imani and Roden Hartsough, and Embla and Torstein Oldervoll; her siblings Neil Condra, Dale Condra, Darrel Condra and Darlene Buckley; and her husband Joe Magruder.