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In Loving Memory of

Marilynn Doane

January 23rd, 2022

Obituary

Marilynn Doane, nee Bell, a long-time Northbrook resident and civic volunteer, died on January 23 from complications of COVID-19. She was 85 and had been in treatment for lymphoma.

The facts of Marilynn’s life mark a common journey for Jewish Chicagoans of her generation. Born at Edgewater hospital on July 25, 1936, she grew up on the city’s northwest side, in Albany Park. Her parents, Harry and Fanny Bell, nee Schaps, were immigrants from eastern Europe who spoke Yiddish in the home. Her father was a presser in a union dress shop, and her uncle Morris Schaps was a senior labor organizer. Her brother Edwin “Jack” Bell became active in Democratic politics, serving as a key parliamentarian at the City Council under Mayor Richard J. Daley. Educated in Chicago Public Schools and at the Navy Pier campus of the University of Illinois, Marilynn graduated from Roosevelt University.

She met her future husband, Warren Doane, on a date set up by mutual friends on New Year’s Eve, 1953-54. After a winding courtship, the couple married in 1957. While Warren attended medical school, Marilynn worked as a legal proofreader at Commerce Clearinghouse publishers. Their first child, Joseph Abram, was born in 1962 while the family was stationed at Chanute Air Force Base in Rantoul, IL. Two more sons followed: Kenneth, born 1965, and Andrew, born 1973. The family lived in West Rogers Park and Skokie before settling in Northbrook. Divorced in 1980, Marilynn went back to school and to work outside the home, serving for 25 years as a medical records technician at Lutheran General Hospital. When the Northbrook Symphony Orchestra was launched in the early 1980s, Marilynn was among its first and most devoted volunteers. In retirement, she maintained a weekly volunteer shift at the Northbrook Public Library through the 2000s and 2010s.

Underlying these commonplace facts was the life of a vital and expansive human spirit. Though quiet and modest to a fault, Marilynn’s honesty and earnestness, loyalty and diligence, kindness and whimsical humor – almost always at her own expense – made her a treasured friend. From top to bottom and beginning to end, she was a mensch.

Utterly lacking in guile, she nonetheless possessed a searching, pragmatic intelligence. Before Google, she was a walking search engine; ask her any question for which she didn’t know an answer, and she would not rest until she found one. An accomplished baker, she would present each (delicious) cake or torte with an apology and critical analysis of its faults. She sewed many of her own clothes and hand made her boys’ Halloween costumes. Canvas totes she made in the 1970s are still used in her son’s household today.

Marilynn had grit, as well. As a single, working mother in her 40s, she survived cancer – twice. In her 70s, she could still return serve and rally on a tennis court with partners half her age. She travelled widely, highlighted by trips to Russia with friends – some she started with and some she made on the way – and to the Galapagos Islands with family, including two of her five grandchildren.

She was a habitual reader (of library books, which were never overdue) and a lifelong learner, a gardener, a defender of all animals, and a walker whose favorite route encompassed the whole of the Chicago Botanic Garden. Her usual companions were Beethoven, Brahms and Mozart, Puccini and Verdi. Music, she said, exalted her soul.

Marilynn is survived by her sons Joseph Abram Doane of Northbrook, Ken (Mary) Doane of Oakland, CA, and Andrew (Marcy) Doane of Vienna, VA; grandchildren Saul, Hannah, Janna, Sarah, and Ethan Doane, who all dearly loved their Bubbie (or Bub or Bubster); sister in-law Nina Bell; fond nieces and nephews, and cherished friends. Service Monday, January 24th, 2:00 p.m. CT at The Chapel, 195 N. Buffalo Grove Rd., Buffalo Grove (1 Block N. of Lake Cook Rd.) Interment Shalom Memorial Park. The service will be livestreamed at Marilynn’s page at www.goldmanfuneralgroup.com. A recoding of the funeral service, a memory wall, and other information will also be available on her page. In lieu of flowers or other tributes, memorial gifts may be made to Friends of the Northbrook Library, www.northbrook.info, or Chicago Botanic Garden, www.chicagobotanic.org. Info: The Goldman Funeral Group 847-478-1600


Arrangements by Goldman Funeral Group. www.goldmanfuneralgroup.com

Donations

FRIENDS OF THE NORTHBROOK PUBLIC LIBRARY INC or Chicago Botanic Garden www.chicagobotanic.org

Memorial Events

Service

Date & Time Monday 01/24/2022 at 02:00 PM

Address Buffalo Grove Chapel - Under the Direction of The Goldman Funeral Group

195 N. Buffalo Grove Road
BUFFALO GROVE, IL 60089

Phone (847) 478-1600

OfficiatorRabbi Barry Schechter

Interment

Address Shalom Memorial Park
1700 W. Rand Road
arlington heights, IL 60004

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