Margaret Sue Fernandez

Margaret Sue

Fernandez

Margaret Sue Fernandez has passed away after a battle with cancer at the age of 72.

Margaret is predeceased by her beloved Mother, Mary Devore Isbell Rogers; her father, Robert C. Isbell; her sister Marion Rohrer (Illinois); and her brother Bobby Louis "Izzy" Isbell (Arkansas).

Margaret is survived by her loving children, her daughter Margaret A. Fernandez, Esq. of Gainesville, Georgia; her son Henry Joseph Fernandez, III (Angelica "Kica" Matos, Esq.) of New Haven, Connecticut; her son Bryan Devore Fernandez, of New York, New York, and by her grandson, Henry Joseph Fernandez, IV; and her granddaughter, Margaret Virginia Fernandez "Ginger."

Margaret also leaves behind her brother, John Ernest Isbell (Edna) of Rickman, Tennessee, and her sister, Lucy Toal, of Northbrook, Illinois, and numerous nieces, nephews, and cousins.

Margaret Sue Isbell was born in Hazen, Arkansas (Prairie County) in 1944. She attended public school in Hazen, Arkansas and was later graduated from Roosevelt High School in Chicago in 1962.

She joined her husband in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1967 upon his hiring with the International Business Machines Corporation.

Margaret was greatly personally affected by the animosity of the desegregation of the Little Rock public schools in 1957, and became dedicated to social justice, and cared deeply for children, the elderly, the poor, and the infirm. As a stay-at-home mother, she became her daughter's Brownie Girl Scout leader in Clinton Corners, New York. She was an active room mother, and the head of the PTA, and tirelessly volunteered in her children's schools and activities. She became an excellent grants writer, and as a volunteer, began writing grants for the Poughkeepsie City Public Schools. One large federal grant Margaret obtained was for Advanced Desegregation Afterschool, which allowed hundreds of City of Poughkeepsie schoolchildren to attend academic, artistic, and intellectual camps after school and to enjoy rural camping with an environmental emphasis during the summers. Margaret also served as a member of the Board of Education for the Poughkeepsie City School District.

Finding herself in the midst of a divorce, at the age of thirty-four, Margaret enrolled as a freshman at the State University of New York at New Paltz, where she graduated with honors in 1982 with a double degree in psychology and sociology. As part of her studies, Margaret taught statistics in the local prisons to inmates seeking degrees. Professionally, Margaret became a civil servant, and a Case Manager at the Office for the Aging for Dutchess County, New York.

Margaret was a loving mother, who believed in, and insisted upon, excellence in all things from her children, and was proud that as a single mother of three children, she could count five Ivy League degrees: her daughter, Margaret, was graduated from Harvard University and Columbia University Law School in the City of New York with honors, her son, Henry, was graduated from Harvard University cum laude and Yale Law School; and her son, Bryan, was graduated from Columbia University with honors.

Margaret will be remembered for her commitment to social justice, fairness, and the rights of children, and for being a friend to all children. She was boundlessly well-informed, immensely kind and generous, had a quick wit, a great sense of irony, a lovely laugh, and used her sharp intellect to promote the interests of children and the poor. Margaret will be missed by many, and especially by her children, who loved her endlessly, and most dearly.

A memorial is planned at a future date.