Widow of columnist Jack Mabley dies at 94
In his lifetime as a newspaper man, Jack Mabley amassed personal stories about presidents and mobsters, Richard J. Daley and Studs Terkel, George Halas and Phil Wrigley, Hugh Hefner and The Beatles, and a host of interesting characters he met along the way.
But the story he loved to tell most was about Memorial Day in 1939. In the 17 years that I was lucky enough to sit next to Jack at the Daily Herald, that story would pop up every spring as predictably as the daffodils.
"Memorial Day is extra special for me because I met my wife that day on a blind date," Jack would begin. "Fran walked out of the door of her house and I said, 'Here's the one for me. The search is over.' It took me about three seconds to decide, 'I'm going to marry this girl.'"
What made this story even sweeter was hearing Fran tell her first impression when she saw Jack. "Oh goody," Fran thought. "He's got a car."
The daughter of Fred and Ann Habeck, Fran used wit, humor and honesty to build a happy marriage that survived almost 66 years with love and grace, regardless of what came their way.
Fran died Sunday at age 94 in her home in Glenview, where Jack had died in 2006.
"She's with dad," said daughter Pat, voicing the sentiments for siblings Jill, Anne and Bob. They penned a tribute calling Fran a "tireless volunteer, an avid tennis player, an hilarious hostess, a quiet philanthropist, and a dear friend to many."
In an era when lots of newspaper men were hard-drinking womanizing cads, Jack remained just a hardworking sober guy who couldn't wait to finish his work so that he could hustle back to Fran and the kids in Glenview. Plenty of photographs show Jack interviewing presidents or famous people. But the only photos he hung in his Daily Herald cubicle were a shot of their four kids giggling on the couch, and a few photographs of Fran.
"Look at this," a beaming Jack would say, pointing out a photo Fran, 20 years old and fresh from her teenage modeling years, sitting coyly on a bench in her parents' backyard in Wilmette; her skirt just short enough to reveal white anklets and Oxfords; the sun shining on her face as she glanced up from her newspaper. Next to that photo was one taken 60 years later showing a white-haired Fran smiling as she hugged a dog.
"Look at this," a beaming Jack would say with the same enthusiasm and admiration he used to describe that first photograph.
They were partners in every sense of the word; "Jack and Fran" to everyone they met. They endured the heartache of watching their firstborn son, Michael, die of leukemia as a toddler. They handled the usual stresses that came from guiding their four remaining children through the turbulent 1960s and '70s.
"The most important person in my life is my wife," Jack once wrote. "Fran has an enormous curiosity, vital for an educated person or a journalist. She is a gleaner. She goes through every newspaper and magazine that I read, and she has an instinctive, unerring eye for useful material that I have missed."
Fran loved jazz, tennis and conversations.
"When we used to travel on assignments, she always came along, and the news sources usually were happier to see her than me," Jack once said. "She also is my best friend, and tolerates me coming home for lunch."
It was, they both said often, a memorable blind date.