On Sunday, January 23, 2022, our beloved Mary Elizabeth Kaufmann passed away in her sleep at her residence in Albuquerque, New Mexico after a brief illness. MaryLee was born on October 11, 1932, in Lewistown, Montana. She was 89 years old.
Two accidents of fate formed the person whom we knew as MaryLee. She was raised on a ranch nine miles from Grass Range, in Montana's high prairie; and, secondly, she grew up without a mother. While the first accident steeled MaryLee along her accomplished life, the second forever haunted her. Growing up motherless was profound absence in her life made by unrequited love. She loved deeply a mother whom she never knew, for her mother died suddenly, with three children at her knee, when MaryLee was 18 months old. MaryLee's longing to know a mother's love moved her to resolutely love life's offerings whin her grasp, such as God, school, family, and nature.
Attending school, first at the one-room Kinnick ranch school, and later at the newly founded Grass Range school, filled MaryLee with the joy of wonder that only formal education can provide to the inquisitive. MaryLee took to school like a duck to water and loved to learn throughout her life. MaryLee graduated from Grass Range high school in 1950, the salutatorian. She attended a year at Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana, with the intention to obtain a degree in fine arts that would lead to a career in interior decoration. But the powers of persuasion of an apt suitor drew her away from university and back to the ranch life in Fergus County. She married John Kaufmann on December 22, 1951.
While choosing to become a ranch wife closed some doors, it opened others for MaryLee. Her refined and calm in-laws, who also resided on the ranch, schooled her in belonging to a place – something MaryLee had not learned in her youth under the watch of a tempestuous father. She learned the culinary arts and how to play bridge at a high level. While MaryLee loved the game until the end of her life, it was the less cerebral card game, pinocle, that knitted MaryLee into a close community of rancher friends whom she adored. Pinocle and bridge round-robin parties were regular events, regardless of the weather, and MaryLee planned her parties like a professional event planner. As a respected member of a close knit community, MaryLee was a loving mother who attended faithfully her five children's school events.
In the sparse moments away from her household and childrearing duties, MaryLee returned to her interests in the arts and focused her attention upon watercolor painting. The ranch house's kitchen, with its strong western light, was turned into a painter's studio every morning until the canvas was signed. Each Sunday, the family motored the sixteen miles into Grass Range, where the couple and the in-laws were members of the Methodist church. Many Sunday meals were shared with her sister's family who enjoyed a day at the ranch under the big sky, away from their home in Lewistown.
MaryLee remained on the ranch until 1974, when, at 42 years young, she resumed her formal education and began to split her time between college and the ranch. In December 1976, MaryLee graduated from Eastern Montana College in Billings, Montana, with double major Bachelor's degrees in Elementary Education K-6 and in Special Education K-12. She taught in various local schools until 1985, when the couple sold the ranch and moved to Belen, New Mexico, just outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico. MaryLee taught in Cuba, New Mexico for several years, then ended her teaching career as a substitute special ed teacher in the Albuquerque school system. She taught well into her 70's. As a devoted literacy advocate, MaryLee volunteered at the Albuquerque Literacy Program and helped adults learn to read English.
In 1988, MaryLee found herself without a life-partner. While teaching and volunteering occupied some of her time, it was her family, and especially her daughter Suzanne who was with her throughout this latter phase of her life, right to the end. Church, bible study, volunteer church greeter, bridge, books, walks, Miniature Schnauzers, and her Albuquerque house and garden kept MaryLee smiling through this trying time. MaryLee found a friend to teach her about New Mexico history by driving her throughout the state to see its wonders, and she found another accomplice who enjoyed traveling abroad. MaryLee also traveled widely in the United States with daughters Debra and Suzanne and with son-in-law Donald Templeton.
MaryLee was preceded in death by her paternal grandparents Stanislaus and Paulina Schultz, by her maternal grandparents Frank and Elizabeth Degner, by her parents Theodore and Ethel Schultz, by her in-laws Charles and Gertrude Kaufmann, by her husband John Kaufmann, by her sister and brother-in-law Patricia and Frank Stolle, by her half-brother Earl Hagemeyer, by her daughter-in-law Rosalyn Kaufmann, her son-in-law Donald Templeton, and by her daughter Debra Kaufmann.
MaryLee is survived by her remaining children and their spouses, Jon Kaufmann, Kerry and Douglas Gardner, Jeffrey and Annie Kaufmann, and Suzanne Templeton, her grandchildren and their spouses, Jake Kaufmann, John Ross and Carmen Kaufmann, Ren and Tiffany Gardner, Kaycee and Chase Moore, Myles Gardner, JT Kaufmann, Kalina Kaufmann, Adrienne O'Loughlin, and Donny Templeton, and by nine great grandchildren, Bennett Kaufmann, Carson, Cooper, Colton, Clayton and Harper Gardner, Lenora (Lennie) Moore and Teigen and Avery O'Loughlin.
A graveside service will be held on Wednesday, June 29, 2022 at 1:00 p.m. at the Central Montana Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Lewistown, Montana. Following the graveside service, a reception will follow at the First Christian Church, 103 12th Ave. S., Lewistown, MT 59457. Condolences may be sent to the family by visiting: http://www.stevensonandsons.com.
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