Marion Garner Mayes, 93, passed away Tuesday evening June 29, 2021, at home in Branford CT with her daughter, Linda Mayes after a several year struggle with Parkinson’s disease. Though she had lived a rich and varied life in Connecticut with Linda for just over a decade, for Marion, Tennessee, Franklin County and Winchester was always her place of the heart and she comes home now to be buried next to her husband, Edward Mayes, in Franklin Memorial Gardens. Marion was born in Warren County, McMinnville, Tennessee to Gertrue and Dudley Garner. She was the second daughter to her parents, but became the eldest after her older sister died in childhood. Quiet with a keen eye and ear for the places and people around her, Marion loved school, reading, and the worlds she discovered in the words and stories. She was a lifelong learner, always asking questions, and wanting to know more even up to her final days. After graduating from high school just as WWII was ending, Marion worked first at Camp Forrest in Tullahoma and then moved to Nashville to work in the Veteran’s Administration. Though she fully anticipated she would have a life in the civil service moving perhaps around the country and especially to Washington DC, she met Edward and they made their life together in Franklin County first in running the Family Drive-In and the Oldham Theaters and then adding on a second business in poultry and Mayes Place eggs. Marion and Edward worked side by side. She sold tickets at the theater, kept the books, and was the steady, supporting presence in a business that can be both exciting and unpredictable. Because she was so interested in people, she got to know the regular customers and their families and developed special, life-long relationships with the high school students who often had their first jobs in the theater. In Mayes Place eggs, she and Ed were again side by side partners. She processed and packed the eggs every day, and he delivered to stores, bakeries, and dining services around the county. They ran this business by day and went to the theaters at night. Work and family were one for them. Still Marion was always stretching herself, and after they made the decision to close Mayes Place eggs, she began working at Farmers Bank and Trust in Winchester that ultimately became Suntrust Bank. She thrived at the bank with her talent for precision and numbers and her interest in people’s stories. After Ed’s death in 1986, she again found new opportunities teaching on Sundays at the First United Methodist Church in Winchester, being active in the Lion’s Club, and immersing herself in her creative world of quilting and knitting. Marion was a master quilter, bringing her love of detail and precision to her quilts that became more and more elaborate and imaginative as she honed her craft. She was an equally skilled knitter most content to be working on the most complex and complicated patterns imaginable. On her retirement from the bank, Marion stretched yet again to come to New Haven Connecticut to be with her daughter and take classes at Yale as an adult learner. That evolved into a job as a data manager in research studies at Yale which she continued until Parkinson’s disease made the challenge of going to work every day too difficult. But just like in the theaters, Marion’s job as a data manager brought her into many close and enduring relationships with young people who recognized her kindness, keen and curious mind, and genuine interest in their stories. They made their way to her office regularly on the pretense of a simple question that quickly evolved into deep and meaningful conversations. Marion is survived by her only daughter, Linda Mayes, of Branford Connecticut and her sisters Marvarene Vincent of Winchester, Tennessee and Dr. Pam Adamson of Hampton, Georgia and brothers Billie Garner of Marietta, Georgia and Dudley Garner of Melbourne, Florida. She is survived too by many nieces and nephews in Franklin County, Memphis, Georgia, and Florida. But she also lives on among the many lives she has touched in her gentle, caring way—the young people she worked with, the families she took a special interest in, the friends whom she loved and always treasured time with. In her always remembering and expressing her gratitude to others, we will always remember and care for her. The magnolia leaves placed on her casket came from the beloved home she and Ed cherished since the 1950’s. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in her name to student internships at Sewanee: The University of the South (https://new.sewanee.edu) or to the Connecticut Hospice (https://www.hospice.com). Visitation will be Tuesday, July 6, 2021 from 9:00am-11:00am at the Winchester First United Methodist Church. Funeral service will follow at 11:00am with Dr. Jane Tillman officiating. Interment will follow in Franklin Memorial Garden with Tom Morrow, Mike Rowland, Gene Seaton, Phillip Custer, Eddie Vincent, Jerry Smith and Davis Mason all serving as pallbearers.
