Mary Allen Obituary

Mary Elizabeth Allen, born July 6th, 1940, daughter of Dr. Ethan P. Allen and Mary Y. Allen died at age 82 on November 29th, 2022. She was born in Iowa City, Iowa, attended schools in Lawrence, Kansas, graduating from Lawrence High School in 1957. She attended the University of Kansas (1958-1962), majoring in elementary education. She pledged Pi Beta Phi social sorority in 1959.

Following graduation she taught in Boulder, Colorado; Mountain View, California; Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Lawrence, Kansas; and the Perry-Lecompton, Kansas school districts for a total of 37 years.

In 1982, she completed her master's degree in education from the University of Kansas.

She was a member of the Lawrence Civic Choir for 15 years, traveling to Europe twice with the group. She was a founding, active members of Chapter I.K, P.E.O for 25 years until health problems prevented her from attending meetings. She received her 50-year P.E.O "Golden Girl" award in 2012.

She was a member of First United Methodist Church, Dickens Readers and loved working in her flower beds.

Following retirement from teaching, she began developing her latent artistic skills, which she had inherited from both parents, and started creating and coloring designs which she had made digitally into notecards used in corresponding with her many faithful friends and family.

Mary Elizabeth would be honored if those who knew her would donate either a Caldecott or Newbery book to the children's room at the Lawrence Public Library in her memory.