Rosemary F. Geist

Rosemary was born in Detroit on November 12, 1928, the daughter of Rev. Dr. Robert M. Frehse, a Presbyterian minister and the director of the Detroit Round Table of the National Conference of Christians and Jews (now National Council for Community & Justice), and Lydia King Frehse, a school principal, columnist, author, singer and homemaker. Her parents founded Camp Westminster on Higgins Lake in 1925, where she was a camper, counselor and director of the arts program. Rosemary married Wood M. Geist in 1951, and they were happily married for 60 years before his death of Alzheimer’s in 2010.

After Rosemary graduated from the University of Michigan School of Architecture and Design, she taught art in the Royal Oak public schools, and later at Kingsbury School in Oxford. She pursued graduate studies in English at Oakland University and the University of Michigan.

Beginning in 1953, Woody and Rosemary lived in, and were always adding to, their historic farmhouse near Romeo. She made it magical at Christmastime. They filled it with music, art, books, pets (especially springer spaniels and an abundance of cats), friends, and kids (their three daughters and scores of others). In the 1960s and ’70s, their backyard was a gathering place for Frisbee-throwing teenagers, gleefully led by Woody.

They listened to, believed in, and learned from young people. They established the Wood and Rosemary Geist Scholarship Fund at the University of Michigan’s College of Literature, Science and the Arts, and they were founding members of the Beacon Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Rochester and Troy. Woody and Rosemary were active in the civil rights, feminist, and anti-war movements.

Rosemary was a lifelong advocate for the arts; she served as a docent at the Cranbrook Art Museum and the Detroit Institute of Arts, helped found the Paint Creek Center for the Arts in Rochester, and volunteered in public school art programs.

Rosemary was a prolific illustrator whose work included pen-and-ink drawings for her mother’s “Nature Now” column in the Birmingham Eccentric, and for her mother’s book of nature essays, Flower in the Crannied Wall. She was also a painter and silversmith. She had a beautiful voice and sang with her family and various choirs.

After she married Woody, she spent every summer at Walloon Lake with her extended family, friends and grandchildren, canoeing and camping well into her 80s. The Geist cottage reflected Rosemary’s warmth, grace, humor and reverence for nature. She was a founding supporter of the Little Traverse Conservancy and helped to preserve hundreds of acres around Walloon Lake and the Great Lakes.

Her life’s work carried on the spirituality and social activism of her parents. Last summer, at the age of 96—in her wheelchair!—she participated in a march for democracy, peace, health, and human rights.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Wood M. Geist, her brother, Robert M. Frehse, Jr, of Bronxville, New York, and her sister, Elizabeth Carter, of Bellevue, Washington.

She is survived by her beloved partner, Ron Fredrick; her daughters Alison Geist (Gary Gregg) of Kalamazoo; Mary Ellen Geist (Tim van Laar) of Grosse Pointe Farms; and Elizabeth Howard (Bill) of Shepherdstown, West Virginia; her grandsons, Charles Gregg-Geist (Megan Way), Will Howard, and Nathan Howard, as well as step-grandchildren, Jacob van Laar (Nisha) Elise Kemler (Chris) and step-great-grandchildren Roland Kemler and Zohra van Laar; her sister, Dale Miller Frehse, and her nephews Robert Max Frehse III and John Wood Frehse and their families; and her dear cousin Kristen King, nieces and nephews.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Walloon Lake Association and Conservancy, PO Box 579, Walloon Lake, MI 49796, https://secure.givelively.org/donate/walloon-lake-association-and-conservancy/2026-annual-guardian-fund, or the American Civil Liberties Union at https://action.aclu.org/give/make-gift-aclu-someones-memory.

A celebration of Rosemary’s life will be held at a later date.