Margaret Eileen Guarino

Margaret Eileen (Shearin) Guarino died peacefully in her Enfield home September 28th after a lengthy illness. Born in 1914 to a Tennessee family of literary dabblers (both her father and great uncle read and wrote poetry in Gaelic), her father also published a number of short stories. The family relocated to Chicago where Margaret, called Peg by all, was enrolled in a convent school. She excelled in writing, debate, drama, swimming, basketball and even Irish step dancing. She began a lifetime of volunteerism at Chicago’s famous Hull House Settlement Home where she also appeared on stage with the Hull House Players. She was forced to decline a drama scholarship after her father was bankrupted by the 1929 Stock Market crash. Because she could not pay additional fees, the scholarship was awarded instead to the future actress Mercedes McCambridge. Peg had to go to work, and found both a job and the love of her life in 1933. She was hostessing public relations flights of the new DC-2 airliner over Lake Michigan at the Chicago World’s Fair when she began dating Martin Carl Guarino, another flying enthusiast. They began trading flights and one-upmanship on their dates. He smuggled her aboard an Italian Seaplane which was also at the fair, but she drew the line at “wing walking” with him on a friend’s biplane. They were married in 1937. Martin served in Naval Intelligence during World War II, which took them to Washington, Boston and finally to San Francisco, before his departure for the Pacific. Upon his return they moved to Texas where they briefly owned an ice cream parlor in Beeville, Texas, where Martin improbably dished up Italian Gelato to oil field roughnecks and cowboys. They moved to the Bohemian Oasis of Austin in 1949 for Martin to attend U.T. While camping in a new Spartan trailer at the Townlake Student Trailer Park, Peg began a long career at U.T. She was a chief archivist for the Military Physics Research Lab, special assistant to the historian Walter Prescott Webb, administrator of various Ford Foundation Grants, associate producer and script editor for one of KLRU’s first television series and the editor of numerous books and publications as well as a contributor to the “Southwestern Historical Quarterly”. She was pinned down in her U.T. office the day of the infamous Whitman shootings. Between editing projects she volunteered as a tutor for G.E.D. and English as a Second Language programs. She worked for many of Senator Ralph W. Yarborough’s senate campaigns as a fundraiser and chairman of volunteers, as well as joining his senate staff as a State Department liaison at the height of the Vietnam War. Her political activism extended to the environment. Peg was a Co-Founder of the Save Barton Creek Association, a supporter of the S.O.S. Alliance, and one of the women who barricaded themselves around a huge pecan tree on Lake Austin Boulevard, forcing Safeway stores to build their new building around an atrium containing the tree. Peg served on the Austin Parks Board’s Aquatic Advisory Committee and was a longtime supporter of both the Austin Aquatic Club and the Austin State School’s annual “Swim-A-Thon” charity. She remained a vigorous swimmer until age 90, and she and Martin rotated between Barton Springs, Deep Eddy, West Enfield, and Reed Pools. She and Martin retained their early enthusiasm for flying, and spent their retirement criss crossing North and South America, the Caribbean, and Europe. Martin preceded Peg in death in 1998. Her last thoughts were of a night flight with Martin over Jazz Age Chicago. Buon Viaggio. Hai Sogni D’oro. Peg leaves behind four children, numerous grandchildren and devoted caregivers Terry Hemphill and Basillio Cedillo. Special thanks to volunteer Kira Hayden and her father Dr. Hans Hayden. We are deeply indebted to Hospice Austin, where memorial contributions may be made. Obituary and guestbook available online at wcfish.com