Mary Elizabeth Rogers, known as “Biz”, passed away peacefully August 7, 2023, at Noble Horizons in Salisbury, CT. She was the loving wife of the late Edward Robert Rogers.Mary Elizabeth Rogers, known as “Biz”, passed away peacefully August 7, 2023, at Noble Horizons in Salisbury, CT. She was the loving wife of the late Edward Robert Rogers.
Biz was born in Iowa Falls, Iowa on June 3, 1925, the daughter of Winifred Brereton and Harold Barzilla Hall. Her family later moved to Ames, Iowa and she was the drum majorette for Ames High School. In 1947 she graduated from Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA, as a political science major. She moved to San Francisco and completed a retailer training program at Macy’s, then made her way to NY to board the SS Ile de France for a voyage to Plymouth, England in August 1950. She and a group of women friends traveled through post-World War II Europe and then returned to NY City, where she decided to stay.
Upon her return, while working as a junior buyer at Bamberger’s department store Biz met her husband Ted. They married in June 1952, in Ames, Iowa, and lived in Manhattan.
Later they moved to Alpine, NJ, where they had three children, then moved to Basel, Switzerland for a year. Upon returning from Switzerland the family settled in Montclair, NJ where Biz later became a travel agent. She and her family moved to Weston, CT many years later, and she became manager of Minute Man Travel, often traveling with Ted to the far reaches of the globe on ‘familiarization’ trips.
In 1995 Biz and Ted built a home and retired to Sharon, CT. Ted passed away in 2008.
Biz had a passion for golf and was the Women’s Champion in 1969 at the Great Chebeague Island Golf Club in Maine, where the family spent summers. She loved to garden and was a longtime member of The Millbrook Garden Club.
Biz is survived by a close knit family, including three adoring children, Geoffrey, Dorian and Jonathan, and their spouses May, Tom and Monica, five grandchildren: Eve, Caitlyn, Julia, Mallory and Celine; and her loving sister Josephine Poling of Wayzata, MN; and nieces and nephews Olivia, Bret, Stephen, Chandler and Julie. Her brother “Bud” (Howard Brereton Hall) predeceased her.
A memorial service will be held on Saturday, September 9th at 10am at Trinity Church Lime Rock at 484 Lime Rock Rd in Lakeville, CT. A reception will follow. Memorial contributions may be made in her name to the Chebeague Island Historical Society.
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 Aboard the SS Ile de France in NYC in the late 1940’s |
