Mary Leah Braun

Mary Leah Braun was born in The New York Hospital in Manhattan on January 28, 1981 and moved to Denver with her parents and her two siblings, Anne and Chet, in 1982. She attended Polton Elementary and Graland Country Day School and graduated from Smoky Hill High School in 1999. During her period at Smoky Hill she initiated the school's chapters of Amnesty International, Students Against Drunk Driving, and United Friends. She loved working as a snow boarding instructor for the Eskimo Ski Club while in high school. She graduated as a National Advanced Placement Scholar and moved on to the University of Pennsylvania. She began her four years at Penn as a chemistry student, but was taken by the inner city problems of Philadelphia and switched her focus to Urban Studies. In 2003, she graduated as an honors student in Urban Studies with a second major in Economics. She loved being a student. While at Penn she balanced her studies with rowing on the woman's crew team and later coxing the men's lightweight crew team---typical Mary, too short for the women's boat but able to steer the men's boat. She also loved playing on the women's ice hockey team. After her graduation from Penn she worked as an Analyst for the Philadelphia Tax Reform Commission. As the 2004 election approached, she moved to Milwaukee to work as a campus organizer for the New Voter's Project. In November 2004, she began work as a Research Fellow for the Center for Public Interest Research in Santa Barbara. In the Fall of 2005, she was diagnosed as having a Major Depressive Disorder, something she fought with all the strength, tenacity, and courage she had. The disease overtook her, and she died April 26, 2006 in Santa Barbara. Memorial gifts may be given to; Mary Leah Braun Fellowship Center for Public Interest Research 1129 State Street, Suite 10 Santa Barbara, CA. 93101 Mary Leah Braun Memorial Fund American Foundation for Suicide Prevention 20 Wall Street, 22nd Floor New York, NY 10005