Marilyn (Huntsberger) McKeever, 83, of Bowling Green, Ohio passed away late Sunday, April 2nd surrounded by her loving family at Hospice of Northwest Ohio in Toledo, Ohio. Born in Cleveland, Ohio to Herbert Huntsberger of Mount Vernon, Ohio and Mae (Wallen) Huntsberger on June 18, 1933. She graduated from Cleveland Heights High School and later attended the University of Miami in Oxford, Ohio.
She married Walter McKeever in September of 1952. Her early working career was spent as the secretary for the head of Technicolor Feature Film Division of Eastman–Kodak in Rochester, NY. During the 1960s Marilyn and her husband were nationally ranked sports-car rallyists and organizers based in Ojai, California. They belonged to the Triumph Car club owning five different TR3, TR4 and TR7 cars. Marilyn was a strong family matriarch and took her family on many road-trip vacations to the county’s finest outdoor attractions and national parks.
McKeever was a volunteer in many community groups and organizations in Flagstaff and Phoenix, Arizona and also in Bowling Green, Ohio. In 1972 Marilyn helped initiate Bowling Green’s first solid waste collection recycling program, H.U.R.T. Inc. (Help Us Recycle Trash). The program eventually merged into the city’s current Bowling Green Recycling Center on N. College Rd. In 1976 she chaired the Bowling Green Bicentennial Celebration committee, which encompassed two weeks of citywide events.
She was also active in the 1970s Equal Rights Amendment movement, and later with the League of Women Voters and the P.E.O. (philanthropic educational organization) Sisterhood organizations. Marilyn became a realtor in the mid-seventies first for Pendleton and then the Valleybrook Realty companies before joining Newlove Realty in 1980. She retired from Newlove in 2003. She remained active in the Wood County Democratic party throughout her life. She also knitted over 200 pet blankets for the Wood County Humane Society.
Marilyn’s sister Lois (Huntsberger) McClurg preceded her in death. Her survivors include her husband, Walter F. McKeever, her daughter, Laura McKeever Tamburo, her son Walter F. “Mac” McKeever and her daughter-in-law Erin Holmberg. Additionally, by her three grandsons: Zack Tamburo, Riggs Tamburo and Cameron Holmberg-McKeever. At her request, no service will be held. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in her name through the Wood County Humane Society’s website.
Arrangements are entrusted with the Deck-Hanneman Funeral Home & Crematory.
