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February 20, 2013
Services
Visiting hours will be held at the Vander May Wayne Colonial Funeral Home, 567 Ratzer Road, Wayne, on Monday, February 25, 2013 from 10 AM – 12 noon. A memorial service will follow at 12 noon. Family and friends will have an opportunity to share their memories and thoughts. Burial will be at the Laurel Grove Memorial Park, Totowa, NJ. A repast will follow.
Lois Jane Marakovitz, 74, a resident of Wayne, died on Wednesday, February 20, 2013.
Lois grew up in Hawthorne and graduated from Hawthorne High School with the class of 1956. She had a strong desire for learning and went on to complete a Bachelor of Arts degree at Montclair State College. She graduated magna cum laude in 1960. Lois taught for six years, mostly at the Benjamin Franklin Junior High School (now middle school) in Teaneck. She made a number of close friends in college and, then, met some exceptional teachers who remained life-long friends. She stopped teaching for a period of time and turned her attention to raising her two daughters. Some years later she returned to teaching as a substitute in the Wayne public schools but soon realized she needed a change. Lois started a new career with Prudential Insurance Company where she was trained in computer programming. She became a systems analyst at Prudential, serving there for over twenty years before joining IBM. She worked for IBM in their Pine Brook office for six years before retiring in 2001.
She and her husband Matthew retired around the same time and traveled together extensively along with their close friends. They visited many places in the U.S. and also went abroad to Europe, traveling to Austria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and Russia. Before their trip to Italy, Lois studied Italian by listening to a tape in her car and learned enough to communicate with the locals. They also visited most of the U.S. National Parks and covered the Eastern Seaboard from Maine to Florida on their many family vacations. One of Lois’ favorite destinations of all was the Jersey Shore. Her father and a close friend had homes on Long Beach Island for many years. When her girls were younger, she enjoyed trips to Point Pleasant Beach. These trips were even more fun when she was joined by her sister, Claire, and niece, Laurie.
Lois enjoyed recreational activities. She loved swimming, especially in her own pool, as well as dancing, water skiing and downhill skiing. She and Matthew took up downhill skiing in their late forties, learning right alongside their daughters. For many years, they skied the slopes of Mount Snow in Vermont but also ventured as far as the steeps of Steamboat Springs in Colorado. She was also a league bowler for thirty years at T-Bowl in Wayne.
Lois also had some more relaxing hobbies. She was an avid reader of novels particularly historical fiction but also some poetry. Like her father, she had a knack for crossword puzzles, eventually conquering the Sunday puzzle in the New York Times. As a young adult, she wrote poetry. Later, she took up drawing and painting. When her daughters started playing the piano, Lois took lessons. The piano teacher came to be another one of her close friends. She also enjoyed sewing and knitting. For many years, she was part of a circle of women who would get together regularly to knit, calling themselves the “knit-wits.” Her flower gardens were another source of joy.
Lois met her husband Matthew while roller skating. Saturday night at the local rink was ‘pick-up night’ and Matthew asked her to skate with him. The two of them fell in love and dated for a couple of years including the time that Matthew was in the service. He proposed to her in Goffle Brook Park while they were listening to the “Caballeros” band play on the lawn. They were married on July 1, 1961 and have enjoyed nearly fifty two years of a loving and wonderful marriage together. Matthew recalls that she was a good person, never judgmental, and never had a bad word to say about anyone.
She will be dearly missed by her loving husband Matthew of Wayne; her two daughters, Susan Marakovitz of Cambridge, Massachusetts and Sharon Marakovitz of Lincoln Park, New Jersey; and a niece, Laurie Serfilippi of Thompson, Pennsylvania. She was predeceased by her sister Claire Giannella of Harford, Pennsylvania in October of 2012.
Donations in Lois’ memory, if friends so wish, may be sent to the HHT Foundation International (www.hht.org), P.O. Box 329, Monkton, MD 21111.
If you would like to send a private condolence directly to the family use this condolence section.
Visiting hours will be held at the Vander May Wayne Colonial Funeral Home, 567 Ratzer Road, Wayne, on Monday, February 25, 2013 from 10 AM – 12 noon. A memorial service will follow at 12 noon. Family and friends will have an opportunity to share their memories and thoughts. Burial will be at the Laurel Grove Memorial Park, Totowa, NJ. A repast will follow.
February 20, 2013
Services
Visiting hours will be held at the Vander May Wayne Colonial Funeral Home, 567 Ratzer Road, Wayne, on Monday, February 25, 2013 from 10 AM – 12 noon. A memorial service will follow at 12 noon. Family and friends will have an opportunity to share their memories and thoughts. Burial will be at the Laurel Grove Memorial Park, Totowa, NJ. A repast will follow.
Lois Jane Marakovitz, 74, a resident of Wayne, died on Wednesday, February 20, 2013.
Lois grew up in Hawthorne and graduated from Hawthorne High School with the class of 1956. She had a strong desire for learning and went on to complete a Bachelor of Arts degree at Montclair State College. She graduated magna cum laude in 1960. Lois taught for six years, mostly at the Benjamin Franklin Junior High School (now middle school) in Teaneck. She made a number of close friends in college and, then, met some exceptional teachers who remained life-long friends. She stopped teaching for a period of time and turned her attention to raising her two daughters. Some years later she returned to teaching as a substitute in the Wayne public schools but soon realized she needed a change. Lois started a new career with Prudential Insurance Company where she was trained in computer programming. She became a systems analyst at Prudential, serving there for over twenty years before joining IBM. She worked for IBM in their Pine Brook office for six years before retiring in 2001.
She and her husband Matthew retired around the same time and traveled together extensively along with their close friends. They visited many places in the U.S. and also went abroad to Europe, traveling to Austria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and Russia. Before their trip to Italy, Lois studied Italian by listening to a tape in her car and learned enough to communicate with the locals. They also visited most of the U.S. National Parks and covered the Eastern Seaboard from Maine to Florida on their many family vacations. One of Lois’ favorite destinations of all was the Jersey Shore. Her father and a close friend had homes on Long Beach Island for many years. When her girls were younger, she enjoyed trips to Point Pleasant Beach. These trips were even more fun when she was joined by her sister, Claire, and niece, Laurie.
Lois enjoyed recreational activities. She loved swimming, especially in her own pool, as well as dancing, water skiing and downhill skiing. She and Matthew took up downhill skiing in their late forties, learning right alongside their daughters. For many years, they skied the slopes of Mount Snow in Vermont but also ventured as far as the steeps of Steamboat Springs in Colorado. She was also a league bowler for thirty years at T-Bowl in Wayne.
Lois also had some more relaxing hobbies. She was an avid reader of novels particularly historical fiction but also some poetry. Like her father, she had a knack for crossword puzzles, eventually conquering the Sunday puzzle in the New York Times. As a young adult, she wrote poetry. Later, she took up drawing and painting. When her daughters started playing the piano, Lois took lessons. The piano teacher came to be another one of her close friends. She also enjoyed sewing and knitting. For many years, she was part of a circle of women who would get together regularly to knit, calling themselves the “knit-wits.” Her flower gardens were another source of joy.
Lois met her husband Matthew while roller skating. Saturday night at the local rink was ‘pick-up night’ and Matthew asked her to skate with him. The two of them fell in love and dated for a couple of years including the time that Matthew was in the service. He proposed to her in Goffle Brook Park while they were listening to the “Caballeros” band play on the lawn. They were married on July 1, 1961 and have enjoyed nearly fifty two years of a loving and wonderful marriage together. Matthew recalls that she was a good person, never judgmental, and never had a bad word to say about anyone.
She will be dearly missed by her loving husband Matthew of Wayne; her two daughters, Susan Marakovitz of Cambridge, Massachusetts and Sharon Marakovitz of Lincoln Park, New Jersey; and a niece, Laurie Serfilippi of Thompson, Pennsylvania. She was predeceased by her sister Claire Giannella of Harford, Pennsylvania in October of 2012.
Donations in Lois’ memory, if friends so wish, may be sent to the HHT Foundation International (www.hht.org), P.O. Box 329, Monkton, MD 21111.
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