Marilyn "Mamie" Coulter Newman, died on Monday, October 4th, after suffering a stroke. She was 91.

Born in Los Angeles, California in 1930 to Bernice "Bea" Sanders Coulter and Clarence Coulter shortly after they emigrated from Saskatchewan, Canada, Mamie was the elder of two daughters. The family moved up and down the west coast, settling for many years in the San Francisco Bay Area and then in Fresno, in the Central Valley of California.  There, she met her future husband Gail Newman on a blind date and, after four months of courting, they married.  Two children followed and the family lived in Fresno for all but one year for the next three decades. Mamie was widowed far too young at age 51.

Mamie was known to family and friends for her exceptional culinary skills, especially Mexican food; her cake decorating expertise; and her love of themes. She was a marvelous entertainer, often making multi-course Mexican dinners, based on recipes she acquired on many family trips to Puebla and Mexico City to visit her sister and brother-in-law, Barbara and Max Tudor. Even the hundreds of school lunch boxes she packed for her children reflected a certain flare not seen in classmates' lunch boxes.  The pinnacle of her cake decorating experience was no doubt the four-tiered wedding cake which she and her children delivered in a red Radio Flyer wagon. Her love of themes knew no bounds; from pink elephants and Flintstone characters to twist dance parties and haunted houses, she was ready, toolbox and paint brush in hand.

Mamie studied art in college, and the homes of her children are graced with her lovely paintings. She held various jobs before and after raising her children: Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, I. Magnin high-end specialty department store, Fresno Public Schools, and University of Nevada Department of Agriculture. When she wasn't working, she was volunteering in her children's classrooms. She was the proud editor of the A.G. Wishon Elementary School Newspaper. She was an excellent writer.

Until her life took a turn for the worse and she stopped walking a few years ago, she was an avid traveler, longtime beachcomber, and regularly walked to stay fit. Mamie was an early advocate of jogging (no doubt swayed by President Kennedy's Council on Physical Fitness although she would never acknowledge the influence of a Democrat). Her children fondly remember her jogging around their large backyard in the early 1960s (although, at the time, they thought it was a little strange).

Mamie will be remembered for many reasons: her kindness, her sprawling collection of frogs, her gorgeous green eyes, and her proclivity for always picking out the perfect greeting card (even if takes hours to do so).

Although she left California to move to Reno, Nevada for twenty years and briefly to New Hampshire (twice), she always felt the pull of her beloved home state. She died in Fallbrook, California.

Mamie did not wish to have a memorial service. Her children will respect her wishes and hold a raucous dinner party in her honor (including, of course, Old Fashioneds).

Mamie leaves behind two children, John Newman of Fallbrook, CA and Susan "Susie" Newman Manfull of Portsmouth, NH; three grandchildren, Chantal Newman Parsons of Fallbrook, CA, Dylan Newman of Oceanside, CA, and Felicia Newman of East Palestine, OH; and two great grandchildren, Sofia and Oliver Parsons of Fallbrook, CA. She was predeceased by husband Gail Newman, sister Barbara Tudor, and granddaughter Alexandra Manfull.

If you would like to express your sympathy, please consider making a donation to The Alex Manfull Memorial Fund to support research, awareness, and education about post-infectious neuroimmune diseases such as PANDAS, a neurological disease triggered by Strep. Mamie's granddaughter Alexandra Manfull died three years ago due to PANDAS: https://thealexmanfullfund.org/the-alex-manfull-memorial.../