Mary Jane "Bobby" Harper

Mary Jane "Bobby" Harper Mary Jane ("Bobby") Harper, 87, of Tallahassee, Florida, died of a hemorrhagic stroke on Sunday, July 11, 2010, in Asheville, North Carolina, at the end of a holiday in her beloved mountains. Bobby was born on November 1, 1922, in Evanston, Illinois, and was raised in Jacksonville, Florida, the youngest of the four daughters of Marguerite ("Peggy") and Fred Hughes. The family spent summers in Little Switzerland and Montreat, North Carolina. Music was Bobby's passion, and she earned a B.A. in piano performance from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, in 1944. While there, she met her future husband, George Mills Harper. They married in 1944. After the war, the couple moved to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where George earned a Ph.D. and began a long academic career as a professor of English. An avid intellect, Bobby held several jobs in publishing and teaching before the births of two daughters, Margaret Mills Harper ("Meg") and Ann Christian Harper ("Chris"), in 1957 and 1959. She played the piano throughout her life and was an enthusiastic supporter of local classical music, among numerous other activities. In her later years, after losing much of her eyesight to macular degeneration, she loved reading widely using "talking books," and at age 83 she embraced a new instrument, the five-string banjo, taking weekly lessons and practicing faithfully. Among the other joys of her final summer were attending the wedding of her granddaughter Grace Pettis, a trip that allowed Bobby to revel in her large and close-knit family. Bobby is survived by her daughter Meg and partner Rick Stoops; Meg's three children, Pierce Rayvon Pettis IV (born 1985), Margaret Grace Pettis (born 1987) and husband Cristóbal López, and George Pettis (born 1990). Bobby is survived also by her daughter Chris; her sister Emily Flournoy Hughes Taber, 98; and a large extended family. Bobby is predeceased by her beloved husband George Mills Harper and sisters Margaret Lee Hughes Kiely and Nancy Sneed Hughes Manson. Funeral and reception will be held at 2 p.m. EDT on Saturday, August 14, at Faith Presbyterian Church, 2200 North Meridian Road, Tallahassee, (850) 385-6151. Please send memorial donations to the National Federation for the Blind (www.music.fsu.edu)">www.nfb.org), Faith Presbyterian Church, or the Florida State University School of Music (www.music.fsu.edu). Bobby's two favorite sayings, which sum up a life lived to the fullest, were Amor Vincet Omnia (Love Conquers All) and Horas Non Numero Nisi Serenas (I Count None But Sunny Hours).