Mary Lee Harvey

Mary Lee Harvey was born on November 15, 1935, In Denver, Colorado. Her parents were Paul and Marguerite King. She was a sister to four siblings: Paul Jr., George, John, and Doris Mae. All have preceded her in death.

The family resided in Wiggins, Colorado, a town that had been established and settled by her mother’s relatives, the High and Huffman families.

When Mary was a toddler, her family briefly moved to Oakland, California.  When World War II began, they moved to a small homestead in the Gridley/Maxwell area. Around the time Mary began high school, they moved once again to North Sacramento where they resided in the Del Paso Heights neighborhood. Mary attended and graduated from Grant High School.

A few years later, she met her future husband, Ralph Harvey, on a blind date. He was stationed at McClellan Air Force Base in North Highlands. They married soon after in December of 1955.

They purchased their first home together in North Highlands and started their family. Belinda was born in 1956, closely followed by the birth of Jill in 1957, Michelle in 1958 and then Dean in 1963. Their youngest, Carolyn, was born in 1970, for a total of five children.

They moved to their home in Citrus heights in 1961 where they raised their family. Mary lived here until the day she died.

Mary was a homemaker. She greeted her kids each day as they returned from school. She was very involved in the PTA and in many school functions. She was also a Girl Scout Troop leader for her two eldest daughters. She and husband Ralph were actively involved in their son’s Boy Scout Troop. She even volunteered as the camp cook for several summers when he attended the weeklong badge skills camp.

Mary loved to quilt and spent many hours perfecting her craft. She made each of her grandchildren their own special quilt. One of her final projects, which became a many years work in progress, was assembling family heirloom quilt squares. Her mother and grandmother had begun this back in the 1930’s and had passed on fabric for the squares to Mary. She assembled the squares and sewed them together and completed beautiful heirloom quilts for each of her five children.

Another of Mary’s favorite activities was gardening. She especially loved her roses and had heirloom plants that she transplanted from her mother and mother-in-law’s yards. The roses have continued to bloom beautifully year after year. Our family hopes to continue this legacy by transplanting cuttings of her roses to our own yards. She also planted tulips, irises and daylilies, but she was most proud of her roses, and they brought her much joy.

Mary wasn’t much of a sports fan but grew to enjoy going to Oakland A’s and Rivercats games with her sports-loving husband, Ralph. She enjoyed attending games with her grandsons and watching games with them on television.

In 1995, Mary started scrapbooking with her daughter Carolyn. She wanted to organize and preserve all her family photo history. Together, they held scrapbooking weekends at her home where other women would join in for a two-to-three-day event working on their scrapbooks and sharing ideas. She made many cherished albums filled with these precious photos.

Mary was a stay at home while her kids were of school age, but once they were grown and mostly out of the house, she worked part time for American Greetings as a card merchandizer. She travelled around the greater Sacramento metro area helping to set up new accounts with stores. She made many new friends and enjoyed her job.

Mary loved to go to Bodega Bay where she and family and friends would camp by the ocean. She spent many vacations there with her grandchildren taking them crabbing on the docks, hiking on the dunes, and of course, roasting marshmallows for s’mores.

When her husband Ralph retired, they went on many adventurous trips with longtime friends, Dick and Naomi Saathoff. It was on one of these road trips to the northeast United States that she purchased her prized Amish quilt. They also went on several RV trips with her brother George travelling on the Alaska Highway as well as along the coast of California. After she was widowed in 2016, Mary continued to travel with her daughters going on a Caribbean and an Alaskan cruise. She also travelled on trips with family to Lake Tahoe, San Diego, Oregon, Colorado, Idaho, North Dakota and South Dakota.

All in all, Mary was blessed with a very full and productive 89 years. She was greatly loved by her family and friends.  She always told them that she wanted to go feet first out her front door just like her husband had, her family was able to honor her wish of letting her peacefully pass away in her home surrounded by loved ones. She passed away on Saturday, December 14th, 2024, around 8:30 am.

Earlier that morning there was a terrible rainstorm. It had finally let up when her grandson, Jake, went out into her backyard and picked a rose to place in her hands just before she took her last breath. He said that the rain had stopped, and the sun had just come out. He said a few birds flew over her house and it was as if the angels were waiting to greet her.

Mary was preceded in death by her husband of 61 years, Ralph, in 2016, and by her daughter, Jill, in August of 2023. She is survived by her four remaining children, 10 grandchildren, 15 great grandchildren, and most recently, her first great-great-grandchild.  Friends and family are invited to attend her funeral service on Monday, January 13, 2025 at 1pm at Price Funeral Chapel (6335 Sunrise Blvd., Citrus Heights, CA 95610).  Interment following at Sylvan Cemetery (7401 Auburn Blvd, Citrus Heights, CA 95610).

To plant a beautiful memorial tree in memory of Mary Lee Harvey, please visit our Tree Store.