Janet Morgan

Born Janet Macfarlane, then Janet Irwin, died Thanksgiving day, gently, inperceptibly. As she said, last week, “I lost my strength.” She was born in Fresno, January 19, 1916, Her father called her “my sunmaid raisin.”

As a little child, she wanted to be a bareback rider.

Her mother, Christine, and father, Donald, lived in Fresno, Marysville, Taft, Oroville, and then Berkeley, with her two brothers and one sister, in the 1920’s. She graduated from the University of California in 1937. She married Richard Irwin and gave birth to Michael in 1942. She worked as a nursery school then kindergarten teacher in Richmond and El Cerrito and had many friends there, teachers, students, parents of students, and friends from the adventurous Berkeley world.

After her divorce she traveled on her own to Mexico and made friends with the Mexican world and its music. She re-married in 1960 to the love of her life, Robert Morgan, and they travelled on camping trips, Sierra Club trips, through the Amazon and Europe.

Not long ago, at the Old Cemetry in Oroville, she said “There’s no one left I can talk to about these people.”

She supported many causes with donations, and her kindness and open directness was a model for many women. As a guide for straightforward honest goodness, she will be missed.

Her ashes will be buried in Oroville with her mother and father.

Donations in her name could go to the Friends of the Bay, American Civil Liberties Union, the Sierra Club or Amnesty International.

A party for her was held at her house, Saturday, Dec. 5th, noon to 4pm, for those who knew her.