By Peggy Harrell Jennings
Happy Birthday Mary Love McCall Strum! When this amazing woman was born on September 11, 1922, in Quitman, Georgia, who could have known the influence and joy she would bring into the world? Her contributions have been many and the list of organizations and volunteer hours for worthwhile groups in Jacksonville is extensive. And we are not just talking past tense.
A dedicated “influencer” before that term existed – just say “Mary Love” and people know of whom you speak – for the Jacksonville Symphony, the Cummer Museum, St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, the River Club, Colonial Dames, the Jacksonville Historical Society and D.A.R. to name a few, Strum’s influence over the years is legendary. This social butterfly not only attends galas, opening events, parties and her grandchildren’s sports functions but also plays bridge twice a week.
“It’s a party if Mom is there,” daughter Carolyn Houston said.
Mary Love arrives in her Lincoln Continental with a license tag bearing her initials and an American flag waving on the front – her sparkly cane glittering, her hair perfectly coiffed and her nails manicured.
“My nails are the prettiest part of me now,” she joked. “I don’t mind being over 100, but I don’t like looking like it.”
This wit and humor add to her charm. Her daughters agree that she embraces the best of everything and has lots of love to give and “people just love her back.”
Raised by her grandparents after her mother died, Mary Love honors her grandmother by being called “Granny” by her grand- and great-grandchildren.
After graduating from Rockmart High School in Georgia, where she was a cheerleader, Mary Love worked at several naval bases. Then fate intervened and she came to the Jacksonville Naval Air Station, where she was secretary for two and a half years to Charles Gray Strum, then lieutenant commander of the base.
A graduate of the Naval Academy who had been at Pearl Harbor, Gray was, according to Mary Love, “good looking, in the Navy, quite a gentleman – and a few other things that I can’t say,” she joked.
“I was going with two young men at the time,” she added, “and I asked the Lord to put the right one in my path and He did.”
Married at NAS chapel in 1951, the young couple lived on Mallory Street in Riverside before moving to Ortega Forrest when it was being built in the 1950s. Gray had grown up in Avondale, attended The Bolles School and his dad was a federal judge, so he had a long history with Jacksonville. After daughters Mary Love (now McArthur) and Carolyn (Houston) were born, the family moved around the world. From the Philippines, where Gray was the commanding officer of the base at Sangley Point, to Morocco where he was senior naval defense attaché, a portion of the children’s lives was spent in Tangiers, Casablanca, Maryland, Washington, D.C. and Pensacola, Florida.
They also traveled to London, France and to India to see the Taj Mahal. All this traveling sounds thrilling, but Mary Love joked, “If you’ve seen one castle you’ve seen them all. I would rather sit outside in a café and drink coffee. I get seasick and I’m scared of airplanes.”
She is quick to add, however, that she loved being a Navy wife. During their time in Morocco (after she had attended attaché school and spent nine months learning French – the diplomatic language), her duties included entertaining twice a month and attending other diplomatic functions five to seven days a week. She entertained many dignitaries, including heiress Barbara Hutton and Jacksonville notables Raymond and Minerva Mason.
“Being a Navy wife was my job and my husband appreciated everything I did,” she said. “I have no regrets, and I love the way my life has gone except for Gray passing on in 2009.”
A self-proclaimed “chicken” who doesn’t like confrontation, Mary Love is outspoken about her beliefs, and her daughters say she was a very strict parent. So strict that daughter Mary Love still has not gotten over not being allowed to attend the Beatles concert when they came to Jacksonville in 1964 because she had to attend a birthday party at the Green Derby instead.
As a mother, Mary Love ’s favorite sentence was “Wouldn’t you like to …?” (whatever she asked) and the girls knew that it was not a suggestion but a directive!
She also has no patience for whiny people. “If you are whiny,” she said, “then no one wants to be around you!”
Mary Love has so many entertaining stories, and her wit and prodigious memory shine like her smile through each one. While riding in a chauffeured car in the Philippines, for example, Mary Love recalls being mobbed by onlookers seeking a closer look.
“I just waved like Queen Elizabeth!” she said.
A longtime member of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, with whom she shares her birth year, Mary Love reads the newspaper and her Bible every day. Her favorite verse is John 3:16.
This joy-filled mother of two, grandmother of seven and great-granny of 20 is expecting two more great-grandchildren in November. An appropriate Bible verse for this amazing lady is Proverbs 17:22: “A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine.”
And being around Mary Love Strum is just the tonic the world needs.
