Jean Marie Mayer

She was known as the female Ansel Adams of the San Joaquin Valley for her multi-award winning B&W fine art photography that galleries from New York to Los Angeles wanted to showcase.
She was also known as the female Warren Buffet for her astute skills in the stock market where investors and stock brokers would make the pilgrimage to her place in Three Rivers to glean financial insights from her and leave richer in many ways.
She was known as Granma Jean on social media who would be thrilled at finding a two dollar bargain at a thrift shop and prided herself on being a cheap date when going to Taco Bell, yet would think of nothing of helping out someone in a financial jam by writing out a check that would change their lives and make their problems instantly go away.
She was nine months older than sliced bread.
Underneath her five foot two, eyes of blue frame was an evenly distributed right brain – left brain giant of a woman who lived life her way, on her terms.
Jean Marie Mayer passed away peacefully at her home early Saturday morning, 28 June 2025 from complications dealing with her lymphatic system, and in that moment, I saw an accumulation of 33 years pass before me.
We met in 1992 just up the road from where she lived when I was giving a talk on China at the old church at Kaweah. Instantly, I found her to be a fascinating woman, and when we met up again a week later at the Kaweah Post Office, she invited me to her home to view her photographic work and other artistic endeavors.
Such an accumulation of various arts (she could pretty much do anything she set her mind to) she possessed that when she turned 90 back in 2017, we did a retrospective of her work at the Cort Gallery where close to a hundred people showed up throughout the day to view her work. On the drive home, she told me it was the best birthday she had ever had that she didn't need a memorial service when she died because this was it.
I was 33 and she was 66 and she'd like to tell people that I acted 15 years older than I was, while she acted 15 years younger, so we were really only three years apart. Over the decades, we were like an old married couple without the fringe benefits, and no one anywhere could understand what we saw in one another. Not even us, but somehow the relationship worked, and I learned so much from her in art, life and finances, especially on matters dealing with money.
"Kevin," she'd admonish, "George, Abe, Tom, Andrew, Ulysses, and Ben are your soldiers. You need to send them out to gather more soldiers, so that in later life you'll be better off than most."
Another tidbit she'd drill into my head, "Kevin, there are only two kinds of economies… Keynesian (borrow and spend) and Austrian (spend only what you have). Keynesian is government payouts and why our country is in a mess. Austrian is you don't buy what you don't have. Never borrow and never feed off the breast of the government. Don't let them own you."
She taught me about stocks; what to look for; how to play the market ("Good market, bad market, a market going sideways.. doesn't matter, you can make money anytime.") and kept reminding me, "When the VIX is high (the public fears the market), it's time to buy. When the VIX is low (the public is comfortable with the market), it's time to go (hold off buying).
She was born and raised in Long Beach, California, and could remember watching the rowers from her house during the 1932 Summer Olympics.
She felt she lived a normal life until I had to point out that while most of us turned 16 and yearned greater freedom by getting our driver's licenses, her grandfather gave her the Oldsmobile dealership of Long Beach for her Sweet 16. I would hardly call that normal.
It was also the year, in 1943, that she made her first stock investment with 10 shares of Chevron for one dollar per share, which she still held onto (and greatly multiplied) after 82 years. She also worked as a riveter after high school at the McDonald-Douglas aircraft facility, doing her part during World War II.
She believed in people who had a vision and invested in them.
When a man by the name of Walt Disney had a dream in 1953 of building a "Happy Place" for families to enjoy, she told him, "Walt, I like your movies, and I think this is a good idea. I'm in," and promptly plucked down a sizable amount of money as one of his first investors.
In 1963, she met with a pair of men who bought an old printing company and decided to get rid of that business and turn to the future, computers. Jean loved reading Popular Science in the 30s as a young girl ("Can you image what the year 2000 might be like? I wonder if I'll still be around?"), and thought these young men were onto something. Since their initial stock was only 25 cents a share, she could afford to buy up a percentage of the company called IBM.
Her other adage to me… "As the stock climbs, sell only enough to get your initial investment back and hold onto the rest. This way, if something goes wrong with the company, you'll at least get back what you put into it." She still holds a vast majority in those two mentioned companies.
Back in the early 80s, a young man with a strange name called Hezy Shaked, approached Jean to let him rent one of her buildings in the Belmont Shore section of Long Beach. He had a bold idea for a new type of store, but lacked the means to get things going. Jean loved his enthusiasm so much that she made a deal with him on rent so that he could pursue his dream of one day owning a chain of stores across the country called TILLY'S. His oldest store is still located in the same building in Long Beach, and Hezy never forgot the kindness Jean showed him during those lean times and would never fail to thank her.
When we met, Jean would attend church with me on Sunday mornings. After sitting through enough sermons, she came to me one day and said, "Kevin, I always thought I was going to Heaven because I was a good person. I don't take advantage of anyone, and I give millions away to charity, but now I understand that isn't enough. I need Jesus in my life, and I want to be baptized." She did, not long after that statement, in the North Fork of the Kaweah River.
At that point, she had a different focus on giving, especially after watching how I tithed. I explained that we own nothing. We are merely caregivers; Stewards of what God blesses us with. It's all His and we are merely the conduit to bless others.
We talked about what I have learned in life, the six levels of giving… in the home, in your community, in your county, in your State, in your Country, and in the world. Not just in money, but in time, strength and energy. Eventually, she would give of her immense wealth with a laser focus, to do all the good she could do and to let people know about Jesus.
When the end was near, she wasn't afraid. I became her main caregiver. Many a day and nights, I'd sit by her bed and we'd talk. She loved hearing about Heaven and what it was going to be like for her since I had been there on a number of occasions (that's a whole other story in itself).
And always, before she became too tired, she'd raise her arms toward me for a hug, embracing me tightly, giving me tiny kisses on the cheek, and reminding me, "I love you so much, Kevin," to which I would return the embrace and the kisses and remind her back, "And I will always love you, Hon." This was our nightly ritual.
And I'd look at her and could see the little girl as I caressed her cheeks. "How pretty you look," I'd smile. She'd smile back and light up.
"It's going to be so long before I see you again," she'd bemoan.
"No, my Darling," I'd say. "For me here, it will be years, but for you in Heaven, it will only be a minute. You have a great reunion ahead of you."
In the early morning hours of Saturday, June 28h, with the sun just ready to rise above the mountains, I went in to check on her as I always do and found she had left to go Home and be with so many family and friends awaiting her, with Jesus being at the head of the crowd. She was the last of her generation to leave this realm, and what a reunion she must be having.
Jean lived a full and well life. Her memory will live on through her charity work and the people throughout the world whose lives she was able to touch for the better. So much she has done through her "soldiers" that it would take at least a book to acknowledge. Suffice to say the ripples of her generosity will be felt for generations.
I will miss my friend, but I hold the comfort that I will see her again. This I know without a doubt through a half century of my own personal experiences.
But at this moment, I am a lonely man with many responsibilities before me. I will get through them because Jean has trained me well and I will do all that I can for as long as life is in me to make her proud of someone else she invested in; to be worthy of her trust in me.