Mary Kay Champion, formerly of Ridgway

Born on Sept. 11, 1921, Mary Kathryn Foster was raised on a family farm in southern Illinois. She was known to most as "Kay" since her days at the University of Illinois. Kay was the second youngest of the five children born to Lane and Mayme Foster of Ridgway. She had a rich childhood working and playing on the farm. At U of I. where she earned a degree in Mathematics, her brother George introduced her to his roommate, Wayne Edwin Champion of Macomb.

Wayne and Kay were married in 1944 just before Wayne was shipped overseas as a Naval Lieutenant in World War II. While he was gone, Kay worked as an efficiency expert in the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co. and gave birth to her first son. Clark. Upon Wayne's return the tiny family moved to Arcata in norther California for several years and then to Menlo Park, where daughter Kristin was born.

In 1954, they purchased an "old" home in Willow Glen which was close to San Jose State. where Wayne had already begun a 50-plus year career teaching Art and Industrial Design. Wayne and Kay worked tirelessly on the house and in the yard where they loved to entertain. Occasionally she worked as a school secretary or a Librarian, but mainly she was Mom, active in SIS Faculty Wives. Willow Glen Methodist Church, PEO and the household manager. She gave birth to her second son, Andrew John, in 1964.

She was 98 when she died of complications from dementia on Aug. 25. 2020. She was always immensely proud of her rapidly expanding family. which, at the time of her death included her three children, 10 grandchildren, 17 great-grandchildren and nine great-great-grandchildren.

The memorial service will be held on Kay's 100th birthday, Sept. ll. 2021 at Willow Glen United Methodist Church at 2 p.m.