Louise Marie Maggio

Louise Marie Maggio died peacefully on Friday, July 25, in the home she shared with her husband of 67 years, Anthony (“Tony”) F. Maggio, where they raised their six children. She was 93 years old. Louise was born on October 7, 1931, to Raymond and Martha Fuhrer in Detroit, Michigan. Throughout her childhood, Louise’s family moved many times, finally settling for a time in Long Island, New York, where Louise graduated from high school. She then obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Albertus Magnus College in New Haven, CT.

After college, Louise worked at Chase Manhattan Bank, as well as at Dunn and Bradstreet. She followed her parents to Charlotte, NC and was employed by Celanese. At the request of her best friend, Louise later moved to El Paso, TX to assume her friend’s teaching position.

It was there where Louise met her soon to be husband, Tony, a 1st Lieutenant in the United States Army, on the steps of a Catholic Church in El Paso where Louise’s best friend was married. Louise and Tony were married in April of 1958 at Immaculate Conception Catholic Church in downtown El Paso, TX. Throughout their marriage and many relocations, Louise and Tony raised six children, finally settling in Oklahoma City, where they have resided for 61 years.

While her primary focus was successfully fulfilling her vocation as a wife and mother, Louise also gave her time to many Catholic religious organizations, as well as pro-life and women’s causes. She was devoted to a mission of encouraging and teaching others to say the Rosary.

Following her mother’s example, she was a dedicated member of the Legion of Mary, whose focus is the glory of God through the holiness of its members developed by prayer and active co-operation in Mary and the Church’s work. As a member of the Legion of Mary, she made weekly trips to local hospitals, visiting the sick and praying the rosary with them. She continued this apostolate until she retired at age 80. She was a member of the “Newcomers” welcoming and outreach group for Christ the King Parish in Oklahoma City.

She was a founding member of the Rose Day legislative action group, focusing on pro-life legislation at the Oklahoma State Capital. She also was a member of a group of women who worked with the State Legislature in support of conservative women’s causes and in opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment to the US Constitution.

Louise, together with Tony, took seriously and followed the Catholic Church’s teaching that parents have the primary responsibility of teaching their children the faith and how to develop a deep relationship with God. She made sure that her children learned the Catholic faith and how to live it day-to-day. Louise and Tony took this calling to the point of helping to found and teach a local Catholic Catechism class program.

Louise was preceded in death by her mother and father and her older sister, Mary Helen Fuhrer. She is survived by her brother Ray Fuhrer (87), her husband Tony (90), six children: David and his wife Joan, Mark and his wife Elizabeth, Thomas and his wife Dianne, Laura, Mary Holden, and Kenneth and his wife Darcy, twenty-two grandchildren, and thirty-five great grandchildren.

Louise, along with her husband Tony, was a member of St. Michael’s Catholic Church in Oklahoma City. She will be remembered by her family, and the Oklahoma City Catholic community, as a matriarch of a vibrant Catholic family and a woman of God, and by her husband as the love of his life.