Mary E. Esch

Mary Elizabeth Jones Esch

88, of Indianapolis, passed away on Thursday, October 16, 2014 at 6:30 p.m. Liz was born on November 20, 1925, the adored only child of middle-aged parents, Rolla and Bernie (Perkins) Jones and the recipient of love and encouragement from a dozen childless aunts and uncles. As a result, she had an idyllic childhood and became a very happy adult, which benefitted her children to an incalculable degree. Her Aunt Annie, a school teacher, taught Liz to read before she turned 5, inspiring a devotion to literature that involved reading 2-4 books a week throughout her life. She grew up in Bloomington, Illinois, where her father, a municipal judge, performed the early Twentieth Century small-town ritual of impersonating Abraham Lincoln, whom he actually resembled, and reciting The Gettysburg Address on The Fourth of July and other civic occasions. Liz graduated from Bloomington High School in 1943 and in 1947 from Northwestern University with a degree in Speech and Theater. On November 27, 1947 she married Charles W. Esch, Jr., a mechanical engineer and friend since grade school. They lived in Cleveland from 1950, where they had two sons. In 1954 they moved to Lima, Ohio, where Liz gave birth to three daughters. She read her favorite books from childhood to all of her children. In 1957 her mother, now a widow, had a stroke, so Liz brought Bernie home and took care of her for the last 4 years of her life. She had a circle of close friends in Lima that she was very sad to leave in 1961 when the family moved to Toledo. But there, in 1965, she discovered the career that would define the second half of her life. Toledo had eliminated funding for libraries in public schools and Liz was one of 4 mothers who created a library for their neighborhood grade school staffed by parent volunteers. She began work on her Master's in library science at Toledo University, and after the family's move to Indianapolis in 1969 earned her degree from Indiana University. She became the librarian at Craig Elementary School and found the work extremely fulfilling. She loved organizing the library and she especially loved encouraging the youngest students to care about books by reading aloud to them in class. After Craig closed she worked at Indian Creek and later Oaklandon Elementary. She retired in 1992 but it didn't last. She took a job at Treehouse Tales, a tiny independent children's bookstore in Nora where for Story Hour she sometimes dressed up like characters in the books she read to pre-school audiences. Liz traveled widely, frequently alone, but in 2003 she began to develop life-shortening health issues that would ultimately require 10 years of doctor's appointments, treatment, and several emergency hospital stays. She never complained because she was so grateful the procedures kept her alive. The reason she survived as long as she did was probably because she always listened to her doctors--with one exception: In February of 2008 her cardiologist gave her the "You only have 2 months, Liz, not 2 years" speech, but she ignored him.

She will be deeply missed by her husband, Charles; children, Bill, Pete (Janet), Mary Austin (Martin), Kit Turner (John), Martha Esch (David); grandchildren, David (Kat), Kate (Chris), Julia, Rachel (Patrick), Alex, Hilary, Brent, Paul, Laura, Greg, Maddy; great-grandsons, Hugo and Wynn. Liz had a brother, Charles Wesley, who died at birth in 1923.

A Celebration of Life Open House will be held for friends, teachers, and former students this Sunday, October 26 from Noon to 4 p.m. in the Hilton North, 8181 N. Shadeland. Liz really loved cats. In memoriam please consider adopting a stray, or a shelter cat or dog, or donating to any animal rescue organization. Arrangements by Indiana Funeral Care and Crematory .