Final Tribute to Margaret McBryan nee Casey Passed on July 17, 2002

Document created by the McBryan women
Document Contributed by Theresa McBryan Edmonton
Click on the photos to see larger versions.

Margaret McBryan
March 31, 1917-July 17,2002
Some of you may know Margaret as a curler; some may know her as a Guide Leader; others as a quilter and a community volunteer; some as a wife, mother grandmother or friend. What we all know is that she was a wonderful loving person who shared many interests and touched many lives.
Those of you who have always known about Marg’s passion for life in the out of doors may not know that she was raised as a city girl in Ottawa. She was the only daughter of Martin and Grace Casey. She had one brother Alan. Her father had been a dory fisherman in Newfoundland but upon moving to Ottowa worked as a night watchman at Rideau Hall. Her mother Grace had trained as a teacher. Her brother Alan enlisted in the service and saw action in WWII. Margaret like many young women of the time worked in a factory building compasses.

She met her husband, a dashing young western airman, just back from the war at a singles dance in Ottawa. With the venturesome spontaneity that was her trademark, after a whirlwind romance, she married this handsome young stranger on September ninth, 1944. Ken McBryan brought her to Alberta and introduced her to life without running water, electricity or central heating. Their first home that they built together after the birth of their first child, Theresa,was a little shack out on the bald prairie on the outskirts of Jasper Place, just west of Edmonton. There were chickens out back, a cranky jersey cow grazing on the road allowance in front and a huge garden. Water was delivered to barrels by the door from a water truck and heat came after hours of splitting wood. She bore her next three children here, Pat, Michael and Denis.

Outdoor activities were a passion Marg and Ken shared with their children. Every Sunday after church, kids, dog and sometimes Grannie were crammed into a very small car for trips out to Stoney Plain or down into the river valley for berry picking, picnicking, boating or cross country skiing, depending upon the season. All of her children learned to quite confidently start a fire with one match in the pouring rain by the time they were seven or eight. This proved a mixed blessing on occasion during our early adolescence but gave us all a very basic sense of self confidence in being able to master one very necessary survival skill, anywhere, anytime.


As her second oldest approached school age in 1954 she and Ken moved into the West End of Edmonton, and back into the world of central heating and running water. Her last child, Maureen was born here.

When her eldest daughter became a Brownie Marg discovered the second great love of her life, the Girl Guide movement. Before we knew it, in 1959, the house was suddenly full of Girl Guide Cookies, the garage jammed with Girl Guide camping equipment. She had become the St. Andrew’s Girl Guide leader.

Marg was a fabulous Guide Leader. She did not care if her girls accumulated proficiency badges. She and her troop were too busy going on Saturday afternoon hikes or going out every summer on really great camping trips. She took her girls into the mountains regularly and one year even made a train trip to the Winnipeg Pan American Games. She and her girls raised the funds for these trips themselves by bottle drives, cookies sales and church bazaars throughout the year.

She taught responsibility, goal setting and proficiency in a multitude of skills to her girls in a way that was so much fun they didn’t even know that they were learning something. Bears were a special challenge to Mum. In bear country she patrolled the campsite with a pot and ladle at the ready, alert to repel any ursine foolish enough to invade her territory. She came home one summer incandescent with delight at having run a bear out of the cook shelter. Her summers camping with he girls were the highlights of her year, planned for meticulously all year long.

When She and Ken moved to Duncan she continued her engagement with the local Guiding community, serving as a leader, trainer and camp adviser to young women who grew from Guides into Leaders under her care. She was awarded

The YM/YWCA Woman of Distinction Award and given a lifetime membership in the Girl Guides of Canada in 2001 in recognition of her 47 years of service.

Family outing to the summer cottage she and Ken had acquired about the same time were also a special delight for her. She loved to bake bread in a coal and wood stove the way she had in the early days f her marriage. She wasn’t quite as enthusiastic sailor as her children, but she still had her own adventures on the water. One evening she took the little putt putt across the Bay to the Mulhurst guide camp, lingered a little too long at campfire, and got lost on the lake in the dark. She missed our point, continued on down the lake until she ran out of gas then rowed to shore at the farthest end of the lake from our cottage. She hitchhiked back at dawn, to the relief of her worried family.


Marg needed a lot of physical activity and good companionship. She swam, curled and bowled regularly, had a full time job when we all reached adolescence. Christmas was always a huge production requiring weeks and weeks of baking to supply family and friends with huge amounts of baked goods.

Marg’s capacity for caring was not limited to young people. Her mother lived with us for many years until here death. Marg also made a point, as her mother-in-law grew older of making a special trip every lunch hour to Grannie Mac’s near-by home to see if she was O.K. She did this faithfully every day until she and her husband retired to the community of Duncan on Vancouver Island.

There, Marg immediately became involved in the excitement of building another house, sailing the boat she and her husband had bought on retirement, traveling, paddling in the bay, planting fruit trees and rose bushes and of course connecting immediately with the local Girl Guides Community and the local curling club. She had no intellectual concept of lifelong learning; she simply lived it. She loved making anything with fabric or food and tried her hand at any fabric craft that came to her attention. She was a night owl and could often be found working into the wee hours on a challenging piece of cross-stitch, embroidery, patchwork, knitting or sewing.

Every person in her extended family eventually acquired a Siwash sweater or two from wool she had spun herself. Having oversupplied the grandchild market she started knitting for the local hospital auxiliary.

Duncan was a long was a long way away for her children, who by this time had young children of their own; to visit very often. Ken and her made many Christmas trips over the mountains to visit children and grandchildren for Christmas.
Her and Ken also made a number of overseas trips during their retirement.

During the rest of the year she kept up her involvement with young people and saw girls who had been members of her troop grow into adulthood and become close friends and leaders themselves. Her spiritual family is immense, far greater than the five children and fifteen grandchildren and great grandchildren she is related to by blood.


She and Ken celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary in 1994 at the home of their son Michael in Calgary.




Mum has always had a great many friends because she has always been such a good friend. She loved her friends and went out of her way at every opportunity to be a gracious hostess who made everybody feel comfortable in civilization or the wild.


Her fellows Guide Leaders were very special to her. Night Owl Marg was always the first one up at camp, bringing morning coffee to the other leaders. Although alcohol was not a large part of Marg’s regular life

she did squirrel away a little bottle of rum for a midnight tipple with “the girls” when she went to Guider Conventions. She loved ditching the dirt with her Guide friend and at her Stitch and Bitch Quilting circle, but tales never got out of the room. Her confidants knew what they said to her was safe with her.

Mum nourished creativity in everyone and was thrilled by any gift the person had invested personal effort in. Her house is full of every kind of handicraft and handmade item her children, Girl Guides or friends ever made for her.

Her family is sad at Margaret’s passing for our own loss.

We do not grieve for lost chances or unexplored potential. Marg lived a very full life and God took her back quickly and painlessly at a moment of great happiness. She had just returned from her son’s 25th Wedding Anniversary, bubbling with delight after a wonderful weekend with children, spouses and grandchildren in Calgary.

We who were there feel very fortunate that we had this chance to see Mum for the last time, happy, health, full of life humor and joy. We ask everyone here to remember her the same way. Mum never cared about badges for her girls; she never desired honors for herself. Her enduring legacy will be in the memories of joy and happiness everyone here can treasure of
their relationship with our mother.

Obit of Ken and Margaret McBryan

Wedding Announcement Ken and Margaret McBryan

Obituary of Grace Lillian Casey, mother of Margaret Casey

Obituary Alan John Casey brother of Margaret (Casey) McBryan p1
Obit A J Casey p2

Obituary of Olive Casey, sister in law of Margaret Casey