Margaret Louise "Peggy" Brill

Margaret Rose Brill, née Margaret Louise Rose, Professor Emerita, Corning Community College, age 92 of Corning, New York died peacefully, wise and witty to the end, on Thursday, 7 November, 2024 at Guthrie Corning Hospital with her daughter by her side. She is survived by that daughter, her only child and dearest friend, Elizabeth Rose Brill, glass artist and marine research assistant; feline companions, LCee and Amalfi; sister, Susan Christine (Rose) Reardon (Walter); and two nephews, Scott Walter Reardon (Darlene and three children) and Leigh Christopher Reardon. In addition to her husband of 63 years, Robert Howard Brill, Research Scientist, Corning Museum of Glass; Peggy is predeceased by her parents, Arnold Sherwood and Edith Margaret Mary (Patterson) Rose; aunt, Adelaide Sherwood Rose; and sister Jane Scott (Rose) Allen.
Peggy was born on 22 June, 1932, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She grew up and received her early education in Sharon Hill, PA, where during summers, she worked at a local farmers market selling Herr's potato chips to earn ticket money for the local movie theatre. Upon graduating from Sharon Hill High School in 1950, Peggy attended Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, NY. Here she enjoyed participating in theatrical activities, as she had in high school, and dabbling in birdwatching and learning to golf, but preferred feeding squirrels through screens of her dorm room and rescuing recalcitrant mice through the propped-open back door of her dormitory. Upon receiving her A. B. in the History of Art from Vassar in 1954, Peggy moved to New York City where, in 1957, she earned her A. M. in English Literature from New York University. While in NYC, she held several positions at businesses which, she was happy to share, went out of business through no fault of her own. Among them were McCall's Magazine and Thorndike-Barnhart Junior Dictionary where she wrote definitions of literary terms.
On 28 December, 1957, Peggy married Robert (Bob) Howard Brill in Sharon Hill in a double wedding ceremony with her younger sister, Jane, and her fiancé. Peggy and Bob then settled in East Orange, New Jersey, where Peggy taught a range of subjects to various grade levels at the Prospect Hill Country Day School. Though she would forever beg to differ, performing even simple mathematical calculations was not her forte. She did enjoy employing her artistic skills, however, to teach addition and subtraction by drawing cats and rabbits. But one day, when it came to adding and subtracting fractions, she found herself needing to draw just half of a cat–she promptly found an eraser and moved on to a poetry lesson.
Peggy and Bob moved to Corning in 1959 when Bob took a position to found the Scientific Research Department at the Corning Museum of Glass. Because Corning did not offer the vibrancy of NYC, they agreed (on Peggy's insistence) to stay in Corning no longer than one year unless she could secure a position at the college.
Luckily, Peggy found a position teaching at Corning Community College in the fall of 1960. The college had opened its doors just two years earlier in a building on West Third Street across the street from Corning Free Academy. Her first classes, English and Literature, were held in an attic classroom. Upon expressing concern that there was no fire escape, a ladder was provided–but it only reached about 1/3 of the distance to the ground. As CCC grew, classes expanded into Old School #3 on Chemung Street, then, in 1963, to the current campus on Spencer Hill. Peggy's oeuvre expanded as well. For a while, she continued teaching English, adding Basic Humanities, American Art, and The Sexes in Art and Literature to her course offerings. Soon, English was relegated to other faculty, as the courses she loved teaching most were the History and Appreciation of Art I and II. These became her signature classes and were the ones that most captured the attention of her students. For many years, they filled to capacity more quickly than any other offering in the CCC catalog.
Peggy's influence at CCC went far beyond the student body. From early days, she made it a point to be involved in academic development and share her (often notably strong) ideas. She advocated early on for equal pay for male and female faculty and, in later years, for achieving and maintaining campus-wide high academic quality. Upon receiving tenure, Peggy felt even more free to voice her opinions, encouraging fellow faculty members to keep rigorous standards, sometimes instigating heated discussions at division meetings and prompting at least one colleague to call her "feisty". Undeterred, Peggy persisted until she retired in May 2007. Her retirement was cut short the day before Fall 2007 classes started by a last-minute glitch with her replacement and she returned to the classroom, not vacating her office until the end of the 2011 Spring semester.
During summer breaks, Peggy traveled with Bob wherever his current research took him. Elizabeth joined them for the first time when she was four years old and inherited her parents' loves of travel, art, science, and animals. For more than 40 years, the three made innumerable trips to Europe, Africa, and Asia. While Bob was working, Peggy took Elizabeth to visit all museums housing her favored works of art (dismissing institutions and artworks she cared for less), many churches (for their architectural intrigue), and every zoo (at Elizabeth's insistence, a trait inherited from her mom). Many of the slides projected onto her classroom screens were taken by Bob and Elizabeth (though until Elizabeth took her course, Peggy accepted credit as photographer). The examples of paintings, sculptures, and architecture she taught were accompanied by lively personal tales of travel. To this day, everywhere Peggy encountered former students, they thanked her for introducing them to faraway places. "I would never have gone to Europe if I had not taken your class" was a common refrain in shops, restaurants, hair salons, car repair shops, and doctors offices across the Southern Tier.
For 51 years, the students of CCC relished Peggy's stories and absorbed her passion for the history of art. Bob once conservatively estimated that Peggy taught more than 9,600 students during the course of her career, but so many others off campus became her students, as well. She lectured at Elderhostel courses, the Elmira Correctional Facility, church programs, library workshops, museum events, and any other venue where she was invited to speak. Teaching was second nature to her. Everywhere she went, she found a fitting lesson to impart concerning art, poetry, or architecture. Her youngest sister, Susie, attended Elmira College, in part, to be near her mentor sister. Her daughter was a captive (usually rapt) audience. Her neighbor volleyed quotes of Shakespearean plays and sonnets with her across Watauga Avenue each morning as they set off for work. Her hair stylists were versed in Gothic architecture. Her officemates, some of her dearest friends, got the scoop on details of artists' lives too risqué to share in the classroom. Her daughter's friends laughed along with her tendency to compare them with actual and fictitious historical figures while benefiting from maternal advice that forced introspection upon them. Her dear Vasser roommate, Olive (Polly) Malcom, with whom she kept in touch throughout her life, shared quotes of favorite poems in their very recent calls. Her caregivers ate up every morsel about Roman and Greek mythology that she doled out. Everyone who spent time with her learned something, very often something unexpected, from Peggy.
Seniors of the Prospect Hill class of 1958, from her pre-Corning years in New Jersey, dedicated their yearbook "To Margaret Rose Brill, whose patience, understanding, and keen sense of wit have guided each of us in our senior year. To one who has stood by us through all our problems and has served as a true friend when we needed her most " It is certain that all of her other students–the doctors, grocers, librarians, receptionists, scientists, servers, et alia–share these sentiments for a person who shared her life and knowledge so freely and fully with everyone she encountered.
For the past 7 1/2 years, Elizabeth served gratefully as primary caregiver to her parents, supervising a 24-hour-a-day team of caring, loyal ladies who entered the fold of this Brill trio. Elizabeth–along with her parents as always–and many beloved kitty cats, all appreciate the superior dedication of those caregivers, too numerous to list.
Per Peggy's wishes, there will be no services. Carpenter's Funeral Home, 14 E. Pulteney St., Corning, NY 14830 has been entrusted with arrangements.
Donations in Peggy's memory may be sent to: Chemung County SPCA, 2435 State Route 352, Elmira, NY 14903, chemungspca.org; Best Friends Animal Society, bestfriends.org; or an animal welfare organization of the donor's choice.