Mary Catherine Evans Collins, Ph. D.

Mary Catherine Evans, born October 25, 1918, in Madison, Wisconsin, to Harold and Alice Evans, was the oldest of four siblings: Mary, Ruth (13 months younger), Betty, and Bill. According to daughter Jennifer, Mary first met Henry Hill Collins III on the ship Queen Mary during World War II when she was headed to England to volunteer as an American Red Cross hospital staff aid and Henry was a lieutenant in the army going to the continent. Mary was then a graduate assistant in psychology at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. The crossing was rough, and only Mary and Henry made it to the deck. Finding Henry with his binoculars, Mary asked what he was doing—watching birds, of course. After the war and Henry's divorce, they met each other again by chance on a New York subway. Mary was in the car when the door opened and in stepped Henry. The twins, Jennifer and Geoffrey, were born in 1951. Before their birth, it appears that Mary worked as a research associate in the Research Center for Human Relations at New York University, as she was the coauthor of a book published in 1951 based on research sponsored by the Research Center. Mary taught psychology at Sarah Lawrence College from about 1951 to 1961. When Henry died in 1961, Mary was just about to take her orals for her PhD from NYU. Receiving the degree, she sold the family home in Scarsdale, moved into the city with the twins who had just turned ten, and began teaching at the Postgraduate Center for Mental Health at NYU. As if these changes were not enough, Mary arranged to have the five books in progress at the time of Henry's death completed and published. Enormous changes for a five-month period. Eventually Mary opened her own practice. In 1963, Mary learned that one could buy tickets for children on the Queen Mary for half price if they were younger than twelve at the time of purchase. So off she went to Bloomingdales to buy tickets for the three of them, a trip to Europe to celebrate the twins' twelfth birthday. In a period when people were frightened about AIDS, Mary offered her professional services to the Lesbian and Gay Community Center in Greenwich Village, near where she lived, for a token $5.00 an hour. Mary loved her work, especially helping people find ways to improve their lives. Up until she was ninety-one, she kept in touch with four of her old patients, one of whom described her as a second mother. According to Geoffrey, this woman would ask herself, ""Now, what would Dr. Collins do?"" With Mary's guidance, she changed her life, leaving a banking career in New York City to become a teacher in Delaware. Jennifer moved to Denver in 1975 and Geoffrey followed a year later. It wasn't until 1994 that Mary followed them west, and for the last years of her life she and Geoffrey shared an apartment until she needed more help than Geoffrey could provide. On May 31, 2012, Mary broke her hip twisting in her bed in the care center where she was living. At age 93, the family decided against surgery. After six days in the hospital, Mary returned to her care center and the family enlisted the help of Hospice, specifically Agape Healthcare Foundation, a Denver hospice group which believes in ""end-of-life care in a spirit of unconditional love."" Mary quickly declined and died on June 11, 2012. Jennifer and her husband Dwight, Geoffrey, and Jennifer's children who live nearby—Evan and Dylan—were there in the last days as well as Jennifer's eight-year-old grandson Haidan (by son of Brandon). A funeral will be held on Saturday, June 23, at the Wellshire Presbyterian Church at 2999 S. Colorado Blvd., Denver, CO. 80210. Jennifer is suggesting that perhaps in lieu of flowers, donations be made to Agape Healthcare Foundation (checks payable to ""The Agape Healthcare Foundation,"" 6041 S. Syracuse Way, Suite 220, Greenwood Village, Colorado, 80111) or the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center at 208 West 13th Street, New York, NY 10011 (you can donate online at http://www.gaycenter.org/support, where there is a space to name the donation as a tribute to Mary). If flowers are sent, they should arrive by Friday, June 22, before noon. They can be sent to the church directly or to either Jennifer or Geoffrey. In 1951, Mary and co-author Morton Deutsch published a book titled Interracial Housing: A Psychological Evaluation of a Social Experiment (University of Minnesota Press). Amazon gives the following description of it: ""One of the most crucial strains on democracy today is the practice of racial segregation. In the press, in local, state, and federal government agencies, in fact, wherever people thrash out the problems of democratic living, the question is being discussed. This book offers facts which throw new light on an important issue in the overall problem of racial segregation. Here are the results of a study comparing two kinds of public housing—segregated and non-segregated. Two low-rent, public housing projects in which Negroes and whites live as next door neighbors were compared with two similar housing developments in which Negroes and whites are assigned to separate buildings or areas. The study reveals how the people living in these contrasting ways differ in their social relations, community morale, racial attitudes, and other significant social aspects. The research procedures used are explained, and general conclusions about changing prejudices are offered. Social scientists, psychologists, housing officials, and community leaders concerned with the problems not only of housing but of race relations in general will find helpful guidance here. In addition to providing much-needed data on an important social problem, the book offers a valuable demonstration of research techniques in social science."" The attached pictures of the article gives a good idea of the importance of this work. Mary, then a research associate in the Research Center for Human Relations at New York University, exemplified the values of service that she and many in the Collins family believed in and lived. Please share your memories of Mary and condolences with her family by clicking on the ""Sign Guestbook"" link below.