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Mary Lawson Obituary
She was born Mary Carolyn Johnson on Nov. 23, 1941, a snowy Sunday, to Jesse Wilson Johnson and Elizabeth Alice Fields Johnson in Ironton, Ohio. It was across the river from their home in Ashland, Kentucky, near where her grandfather, former Kentucky Governor and Congressman William Jason Fields, practiced law after leaving Congress and the governor's mansion.
The Johnsons gave Mary Carolyn a brother, Mark Fields Johnson, and sister Patricia Fields Johnson. The family moved throughout the country when Mary Carolyn was a girl and she attended more than a dozen schools before graduating from Largo High School in 1959. She worked at Honeywell, where her father also worked, and at Maas Brothers Department Store as a model before, during and after graduating from the University of South Florida.
She met and married Wade Roach in Plymouth, North Carolina, where she was teaching elementary school, and then the couple moved to Idabel, Oklahoma, where they had two sons, Adam and Seth. The family moved to New Bern, North Carolina, and lived there for several years.
Mary Carolyn later settled in Tampa, where she taught school for many years, including at Buchanan Middle School and Shaw Elementary School.
Following her retirement from teaching, she traveled throughout Europe and lived for several years in Scotland. She also traveled throughout the United States, staying with friends, before moving to Charlottesville, Virginia. She finally returned to New Bern to be close to her son, Adam.
Following a stroke and the onset of dementia, she spent her final years in a nursing home in Raleigh, North Carolina.
She was predeceased by her parents, a child who died at birth, Paul, and her brother Mark. She is survived by: son Adam; son Seth and his wife Heather; grandson Ian Roach and his wife Baylei; and her sister Patricia Anderson.
A private celebration of life will be held in May.
To plant trees in memory, please visit the Sympathy Store.
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