New Jersey State Button Society

In Memoriam

Mary O. Conlon

Mary Olive Conlon, 79, of Brielle passed at home on April 18.  A Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated at St. Catharine Roman Catholic Church in Spring Lake.

Buttons:  She was treasurer of the New Jersey State Button Society (NJSBS) from 2004 - 2007, a member of the Jersey Shore Button Club, Central Jersey Buttoniers and National Button Society. 

    Specializing in cats, owls and studio buttons, Mary presented the “History of New Jersey Studio-Button Makers” at the May 2007 NJSBS Spring Show.  Her PowerPoint talk illustrated the works of 23 New Jersey studio artists, from the 1940s through modern-day, and the wide variety of materials they used: carved pearl; wood Marquetry; glass lamp work, including paperweights; ceramic; leather; polyester and etched Pinna shells. The program was re-printed in the Fall 2007 edition of the NJSBS Bulletin (Vol. 66, No. 1). 

Canadian Background:  The first born in her family, Mary was given the first names of her grandmothers: “Mary,” for Mary Doran Conlon, and “Olive,” for Olive Gravell Bedard.  
   
    She was born in Port Lambton, which lies on the Canadian side of the St. Clair River in Ontario Province, opposite the State of Michigan in the USA, and was raised in nearby Sombra, which means “shade” in Spanish. A neighboring town, Corunna, honored the Battle of Corunna, fought in Spain in 1809, when the British defeated the French during the Napoleonic Wars.

    The St. Clair River, itself, is part of the Great Lakes watershed: the 39-mile-long river drains from Lake Huron (second largest of the Great Lakes) into St. Clair Lake, which, in turn, empties into the 32-mile-long Detroit River, which flows into Lake Erie (fourth largest of the Great Lakes). 

Education and Work Background:  Mary received her BA and Master’s degrees from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, and upon graduation, received the Marty Memorial Scholarship from the Queen’s University Alumni Association. This scholarship enabled her to enroll at Columbia University in New York City, where over a period of years, she completed coursework in economics for a PhD, and taught undergraduate courses in economics.  Mary was hired by Mobil Oil Corporation, headquartered in New York City, as its first female economist.  She stayed in New York for 32 years, living in mid-town Manhattan.