Petra Olea Mcgeary

Born in Canada to Paulina and Tosten Nilson (Nelson), on March 8, 1922, she grew up in Minneapolis, where she married Thomas D. McGeary in 1944. After living briefly in Frankfurt, Germany, after the war, they moved to San Diego in 1950. They were the original occupants for sixty years of a home they purchased in La Mesa.

Petra delighted in meeting new people and enjoyed being an Avon and Mary Kaye cosmetics representative, and later an associate in a uniform store.

An early member of the United Church of Christ in La Mesa, she was active in the Beta Sigma Phi sorority, and a member of Sons of Norway.

Petra loved music: she played piano and sang in the San Diego Chapter of the Sweet Adelines. For many years, she was a Wednesday-night regular at Kelly's Piano Bar in Mission Valley.

An avid collector of antiques, she loved playing RummiKub.

Petra was an adventurous traveler and enjoyed the sociability of going on ocean cruises. She visited Australia, Ecuador, Britain, Norway, Germany, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Thailand, Jordan, the Adriatic Coast, and Mexico, where she went parasailing at the age of seventy.

She was preceded in death by her brother and sister Tommy Nelson and Barbara Barney. Petra is survived by her children Thomas and Brian McGeary and by Barbara Best; and by her grandchildren Sean, Trevor, and Avery McGeary and Austin Best.

At her request, there was no ceremony, and her cremated remains will be scattered at sea.