Mary Louise Reed Eubank

1925 - 2016

Mary Louise Reed Eubank, 91, passed away May 14, 2016, at the Sitka Pioneers' Home in Sitka. Services were held May 23 in the Sitka Pioneers Home, where she resided the past three years of her life. 
Mary Lou was born March 6, 1925, in Morris, Kansas, to Percy Hillmon Reed and Virgil Gladys Groome. Mary graduated from Brandon High School in Tampa, Florida, in 1941, at age 16, and then Texas Women's University, in Denton, Texas, in 1947 with a bachelor of science in interior design and art. Her artistic ability included making jewelry from silver and gold and stone settings, and she loved visiting art museums throughout the country. 
She met her husband, John Eubank, in 1949 in Dallas, Texas, and they married Dec. 27, 1950. Before leaving Texas, she taught third grade in Ingleside. With four children aged 4, 6, 8 and 10, they drove the Alaska Highway, pulling two trailers from Texas to Alaska, arriving in June 1962. They made Fairbanks their home and homesteaded five acres on the Old Nenana Highway, two miles south of the university so she could continue her art degree at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
She graduated in 1968 with a master's degree in art. Her thesis was written and published, entitled: "Carving Alaskan Soapstone" but she liked carving in marble the best. She loved visiting the Alaska soapstone mine near Palmer in the summers and enjoyed bringing back large stones to see what art forms came to her. She said the stone dictated what to carve.
She was a stay at home mom until 1974 when she started working at Bechtel Corporation with the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline Service and later as a catalogue specialist in the archive division at the University of Alaska Rasmussen Library until she retired in 1990 at age 65.
Mary was always interested in genealogy from a very young age and found she had a natural talent. Her family's genealogy consisted of more than 5,000 individuals and a multitude of pictures. After retirement, she spent most of her free time researching the family tree. As an artist, Mary had the most exquisite penmanship and practiced calligraphy. 
Her membership activities included being a founding member of the Fairbanks Arts Association, a 40-year member of the Alaska Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, a life member of the Pioneers of Alaska, The Sons of Norway, German Club, Dinosaur Club, (retirees from the Rasmuson Library) and the Anglican/Episcopal Church.
Mary's survivors include a younger sister, Alice Reed Haley, of Albuquerque, New Mexico; daughter Roberta Littlefield, of Sitka; son Gregory Eubank, of Anchorage; and daughter Celeste Goering, of Fairbanks and Phoenix. She is survived by seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
Mary is predeceased in death by husband John J. Eubank in 2001; son John David Eubank in 2007; brother William Walter Reed II in 2009; and grandson John Joseph Beans Eubank in 2013. 
The family asks that memorial donations be made to a favorite charity of choice.