Mary Martin Bowen

Mary Martin Bowen

January 15, 1936 - October 6, 2023

Mary Martin Bowen, beloved wife, mother, and grandmother, passed away at home on October 6, 2023, at the age of 87. She was born on January 15, 1936, in Decatur, Georgia, to Mary Lou Martin of Newnan, Georgia, and James Curran Davis of Franklin, Georgia. She was their only child.

Mary Martin spent her early childhood growing up on the family farm near Stone Mountain where her family raised cattle, chickens and hogs. At the onset of the Second World War, they added a victory garden to help feed the family and to make some extra money selling produce on the square in Decatur. It was truly a family farming business in that her mother, who was a biology teacher, ran the chicken operation, her grandmother tended the garden, her daddy handled the cattle, and she helped wherever and whenever she was not attending school.

Following the War, her father who was currently serving as a Superior Court Judge in DeKalb County, was encouraged by a number of people to run for Congress. Having previously served as a State Legislator, he was no stranger to politics, and he decided to run. Mary Martin, having no interest whatsoever in leaving the farm, and moving to Washington, D.C., immediately launched a counter-campaign against her father in a homemade newspaper titled The Truth. In spite of her best efforts, her father won and soon the family made the move. Her father served 16 years in the Congress. He was a Democrat, and she joked that she had never seen a Republican until she was 11 years old. The moves back and forth between Washington and Decatur were trying, but they formed a lasting impression which remained with her throughout her life, but as Mary Martin said, there's no place like home. She was always a farm girl at heart and she was happy to call Decatur her home.

After Mary Martin graduated from Decatur Girl's High School in 1953, she attended Randolph Macon Woman's College (RMWC) in Lynchburg, Virginia, where she was a member of Phi Mu sorority, Phi Beta Kappa society, and earned a BA in 1957, graduating with honors. Knowing that she needed an advanced degree in order to pursue her teaching career, she accepted an academic scholarship, and enrolled at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, where she received an MA in 1959.

It was while she was attending Duke University that she met her future husband of 50 years. It's a long story, but Mary Martin met Edward Gene Bowen from Lakeland, Florida, who was a medical student at Duke. They met at the Men's Graduate Center cafeteria, and he called her the next day to invite her to the upcoming football game. As the story goes, he did not have much money, so she had to buy her own ticket to the game. Mary Martin always said, that was the best $2.50 she had ever spent!

Mary Martin and Ed were married at the First Baptist Church of Decatur in 1960. As Mary Martin recalls, Daddy was serving in Congress, and it was an election year, so it was a whopper of a wedding, and she remembers having to write 1,250 thank you notes!

The next year, Ed joined the Air Force, as was required in those days. They were stationed in Wiesbaden, Germany, where Ed was an orthopedic surgeon at the hospital, and Mary Martin taught English at the junior high school. Interestingly, one of her students was Priscilla Beaulieu, who later met and married Elvis Presley. While they were stationed in Germany, the Berlin Wall was erected, and President Kennedy was assassinated.

After completing his military service, they returned home, where Ed worked at Grady Hospital, and Mary Martin continued teaching at Atlanta Baptist College, which later became Mercer College. Not soon thereafter, she had to take a year off from teaching to care for her mother who was suffering from strokes. After her mother's untimely death, she returned to work until her father was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease.

In 1970, Mary Martin officially retired from her teaching career in order to look after her ailing father and her three children. However, politics had become infused in her blood, and she continued to work as a volunteer by serving her neighborhood voting precincts for every local, state, and national election from 1970 until 2020.

She was also appointed by Governor Joe Frank Harris to serve on the State of Georgia's Ethics Commission to protect the integrity of the democratic process and to ensure fair elections from 1983 to 1991. In addition, she served as President of the RMWC Alumnae Association, as well as serving on the Advisory Board of Duke University School of Nursing. For her services, she received many honors, but her most prized possession was the prestigious RMWC Alumnae Achievement Award in 2009.

Mary Martin was predeceased by her mother, Mary Lou Martin Davis; her father, James Curran Davis; her husband, Edward Gene Bowen; and her grandson, Edward Burris Bowen. She is survived by her three children: Curran (Caroline) Bowen; Sandy (Hayden) Bowen; Louisa Bowen (Damon) Edmondson; and seven grandchildren: Jeb, Cooper, and Ware Edmondson; Richard and Ann Ellis Bowen; Kirby and Mary Martin Bowen.

Services will be held at A. S. Turner & Sons, 2773 N. Decatur Road, Decatur, Georgia 30033, on Saturday, October 14, 2023. Visitation at 10:00am, with a funeral service at 11:00am, followed by a graveside service at Oak Hill Cemetery, 96 Jefferson Street, Newnan, Georgia 30263 at 2:00pm.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to the Alumnae Scholarship Fund of Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia; or Duke University, School of Nursing to benefit students from the Appalachian counties of Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia.

Condolences may be expressed to the family online at www.asturner.com

A.S. Turner & Sons Funeral Home & Crematory