Long, Marilyn Stookesberry

Marilyn Stookesberry Long of Iowa City, died peacefully at her Oaknoll home on Thursday, July 29, 2010, at the age of 80.

Funeral services will be held at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, August 1, 2010, at the First Christian Church in Coralville, with the Rev. John McKinstry officiating. Visitation will be from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. Sunday at the church. Burial will take place following the services at Memory Gardens Cemetery in Iowa City. Memorial donations can be made in Marilyn's memory to the First Christian Church or Project GREEN (Iowa City).

Online condolences may be sent to Marilyn's family through the web at

Marilyn Joy Stookesberry was born on April 17, 1930, in Bloomfield, Iowa, the daughter of Alva Leo and Esther Olive (Altheide) Stookesberry. Spending her formative years on the family farm in Bloomfield, Iowa, Marilyn attended a one-room country school through eighth grade. She graduated from Bloomfield High School and subsequently Ottumwa Heights College (now Indian Hills Junior College). In 1951, she completed her B.A. in radio journalism at the University of Iowa.

While a student at the University of Iowa, Marilyn married John Paul Long, also from Bloomfield, Iowa, in 1950. With the exception of two years in Albany, N.Y., and a brief sabbatical in Nottingham, England, Marilyn and her husband proudly lived and raised a growing family in Iowa City, Iowa.

Marilyn was a talented gardener and was a founding member of Project GREEN, a city beautification group. In 1998, she was honored as editor emerita of the Project GREEN newsletter for 25 years of service. Through the years, Marilyn nurtured innumerable flats of plants started from perennial seeds in her basement during Iowa winters for the spring Project GREEN Garden Fair.

Marilyn was an active and long-standing member of the First Christian Church. A world traveler, she accompanied her husband on his professional trips and traveled regularly for enrichment. An active faculty wife, she helped found the John Paul Long Endowed Chair in Pharmacology at the University of Iowa. In her later years, she and her husband resided in the Oaknoll Retirement Community where she nurtured both people and plants.

Marilyn approached life with joy, precision and a clear sense of purpose. She valued her extended family and friends. She will be remembered fondly as a loving and devoted wife and an engaged and exemplary mother and grandmother.

Her children are Jeffrey P. Long and his wife, Jody of Houma, La., John A. Long and his wife, Sheri Spaine Long of Birmingham, Ala., and Jane Peterson and her husband, Steve of St. Joseph, Mich.; and grandchildren, Alicia Long, Paul Long, Phillip Long, Morgan Long and John Richard Long, and Nicholas Peterson and Matthew Peterson.

Her brothers, Jim and Gary Stookesberry of Ottumwa, also survive her.

Her husband, John Paul; sister, Jeri Ridnour; and her parents, preceded her in death.

Gay & Ciha Funeral and Cremation Service is caring for Marilyn's family and her services.