Marilyn King Gemberling

Marilyn was the daughter of Clarence W. King and Hallie Danford King. She was born in Akron, Ohio. In many ways she was a woman ahead of her time. She completed her Bachelor’s in Speech and Communication from Akron University in 1950. She completed her Master’s in Speech and Communication from Ohio State University in 1952. While working on her Ph.D. at Northwestern University, she had the good fortune to have Dorothy Gemberling as her roommate. Through Dorothy, Marilyn met her future husband, Theodore M. Gemberling (Dorothy’s brother). They were married in August 1955 at Marilyn’s parents’ house in Akron. Their wedding ceremony was performed by her Uncle Myron Danford, a Lutheran Minister. She was a University Lecturer (including first woman at Purdue Speech and Communications Department; University of New Mexico, Moorpark College, and University of Southern California). Marilyn had a second career as a Librarian at California Lutheran College/ University.

It seems fitting that Marilyn passed away on the day of the Indy 500. She was a big fan of Indy car racing, among many other sports, including: baseball - Cleveland Indians (she often reflected on her opportunity to attend one of the 1948 Cleveland Indians World Series Games and often spoke of the joy of watching Satchel Paige pitch) and the Los Angeles Dodgers; Basketball - Los Angeles Clippers, and she always thoroughly enjoyed filling out her brackets for March Madness; Football: Ohio State Buckeyes, and the USC Trojans; Horse racing: In particular the Triple Crown Races; and Hockey – the two time Stanley Cup winning Los Angeles Kings!

She is survived by her four sons: Charles, William, James, and Thomas; Daughter-in-Law Lisa; 2 grandsons: Zachary and Nickolas; sister-in-law Dorothy Gemberling; Nieces Diana and Darlene; Nephew William; and many, many cousins. Marilyn was deeply devoted to her family. She was very involved with her sons’ swim teams working as a clerk of course (seeding, timecards, etc). Marilyn and her eldest son, Chuck had an especially close bond throughout her life, both looking out for each other, including walks for exercise, reading books, and watching classic movies. Marilyn enjoyed her weekly Saturday evening calls from her youngest son, Tom, a resident of Phoenix. To the end of her life she enjoyed working on cross word puzzles and reading books, especially History/ Political Science and Mysteries. She was recently expanding out to Harry Potter. Music also played a big part in her life, she lovingly shared this with each of her sons. Her favorites were folk, rock and roll, and classical, she could also converse with people about current music of all genres, including rap, which amused her sons. Mom (and Dad) also had an amazing personal/ family library of over ten thousand books.

Mom was diagnosed eight and a half years ago with stage four cancer to which she said “bring on the chemo, bring on the radiation”. We were also very fortunate that her cancer care was provided by Dr. Scott Eisenkop, Nicole and others. We all feel extremely fortunate that we had mom for this “bonus time”.

Mom moved to Thousand Oaks with “her boys” along with her parents in 1970.

In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to your public library.