Margaret Bebié "Peggy" Thomson

1922 - 2016

HOLYOKE - Margaret "Peggy" Bebié Thomson, 93, died peacefully early Thursday, Oct. 20, 2016, at Mary's Meadow in Holyoke, with her daughter-in-law Ann at her side.

Peggy was born Nov. 6, 1922, in St. Louis, to the late Jules and Helen (Gilli) Bebié. Her parents had immigrated to the United States from Switzerland. Her dad came to be a chemist with Monsanto; her mom, to help take care of her sister's child. The youngest of three children, Peggy had a beloved older sister Yvonne and an older brother Hans.

Peggy was a brilliant student. She entered Swarthmore College as a 16 year old and met her future husband, John Seabury Thomson, during her first year. The son of missionaries, John had been born in Nanking, China, where he grew up until he came stateside for college. He was waiting tables in Peggy's dining hall when they met; Peggy told her friends soon thereafter that he was the man she was going to marry.

John took accelerated graduation in order to join the war effort. Peggy and John were married in 1945 during his brief furlough from the Navy, and their honeymoon was the train trip on the way to John's deployment overseas. Peggy moved in with college friends in New York City and began her lifelong career as a writer, taking a job with Life magazine. When John returned from the war, he entered Columbia University, where he earned a doctorate in political science.

Their oldest child, Christopher, was born in New York City. In 1951, they moved to Madison, Wisconsin, where John took a position on the faculty at the University of Wisconsin, and two more children, Hilary and David, were born. John had worked with the OSS in China during the war, and in 1957 the family moved from Madison, to Washington DC, where John became a political analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency.

The family moved into a big old white stucco house in Chevy Chase, Maryland, where Peggy lived for 53 years. Their home became a meeting place, hostel, and refuge for many, many people over the years -- students, relatives, friends, and distant friends of friends, who came sometimes for a quick visit, sometimes for years. One never knew who would be there for dinner or how long they would stay. During the Civil Rights marches and Vietnam War protests, the big attic of the house was filled with all sorts of people. Peggy often cooked a one-pot meal she called "National Emergency Soup".

Peggy started writing again when her children were all in school. She wrote freelance articles for The Progressive magazine, then took a position at The Washington Post, and wrote regularly for the Potomac Magazine and The Washingtonian. Her children all clearly remember the thundering sound of her hammering away at the typewriter in her study.

Later, Peggy began writing non-fiction books. She wrote 10 books for young adults – one about a spaghetti factory, another about making baseball bats, and one about reading palms. She wrote a book about Katie Henio, a Navajo woman who raised sheep and wove rugs, and another about the children in an industrial town in China. She also wrote five books about the Smithsonian Institute. Her most acclaimed book was Auks, Rocks and the Odd Dinosaur, about the Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian. This book won a Horn Book Award in 1986 for best non-fiction for young adults.

Peggy was a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat and social activist. She worked with her husband for years at a soup kitchen for the homeless, sponsored by their Unitarian Church. She volunteered in the inner city schools, teaching writing and research skills and reading her books. Peggy and John took part in the Civil Rights marches in Washington and the Poor Peoples March. Peggy rode a bus with other church members one summer to Danville, Virginia, to help with black voter registration.

Every three or four years in the summer, the family traveled to Zuoz, Switzerland, a small village in the Engadine where her family built a home in the early 1800's and where her grandfather had been chief engineer of the railway system of stone bridges and tunnels winding through the Swiss Alps. Peggy and family loved to take the train up or down the valley to hike in the mountains and then return for tea and delicious tarts at a local patisserie.

Almost every summer since the 1960's, Peggy and family went to Cotuit, Cape Cod, in August. For years they rented a tiny house on the water and later bought a summer house where their children and grandchildren would make their way most summers.

Peggy and John always had a dog – first was Tommy, a very fat beagle, then a string of wonderful golden retrievers. Every Sunday for many, many years John and Peggy would join their best friends for a dog walk along the C&O Canal.

In 1998, John died of a heart attack at the end of a fine evening canoeing with friends. Peggy remained living in the big house in Chevy Chase, Maryland, for many years, with a continuing flow of house guests. And she continued writing books and her one-of-a-kind letters where her writing would fill the page, then circle around the edges, finishing back on the top of the page. All her friends were used to receiving stacks of newspaper clippings, with personal notes scribbled in the margins.

Peggy slowly began to show signs of dementia, so in the summer of 2010 she moved to Northampton, to be near family. She lived in the Gardens at Rockridge Retirement Community until the spring of 2013, when she fell and broke her hip. She moved to Mary's Meadow at Providence Place, where she lived until her death.

Peggy was predeceased by her parents, siblings, and her spouse. She is survived by her children Christopher (Susan Livermore) of Ribera, New Mexico, Hilary (Tom Fredenburg) of Concord, New Hampshire, and David (Ann McEwen) of Northampton. She leaves six grandchildren, Angus Fredenburg, Maddie Thomson, Kyra Thomson, Justine Thomson, Jamie Thomson and Mikey Thomson.

Donations in Peggy's memory can be sent to the Cotuit Public Library, 871 Main St., Cotuit, MA 02635, Hospice Life Care, 575 Beech St., Holyoke, MA 01040, or the Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church, 9601 Cedar Lane, Bethesda, MD 20814.

A gathering is being planned in the spring for family and friends to celebrate her so-well-lived life. The Czelusniak Funeral Home of Northampton has been entrusted with arrangements.

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