Margaret Crist

Margaret “Margo” Leona Crist passed away on December 15, 2021, at her Amherst, Massachusetts home. Margaret Crist was born on May 20, 1947, in Belleville, Kansas to Roy and Leona (Woodward) Crist. After living in Belleville and Colby, the family moved to a farm in the McDonald School District where she participated in music, drama, school clubs, competitive typing, competitive spelling, and the new women’s basketball team. After graduating as valedictorian, she attended the University of Kansas, where she was regularly on the honor roll, received three prestigious scholarships, worked as a resident advisor in a freshman women’s dorm, was a member of Mortar Board and Phi Beta Kappa, and graduated in 1965. Margo earned a master’s in library science from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. In 1969 she worked at the Boston Public Library as a research librarian, and later as the branch librarian in Charlestown, Massachusetts, taking particular joy in providing services to senior citizens. For the next seven years, Margo served as regional administrator for the Central and Western Massachusetts Resource Sharing network. During this period, she met Joe Hopkins, director of the Worcester Public Library, who became her life partner. Over the years, they read, traveled, skied, biked, and danced together. Margo delighted in becoming the matriarch of the Hopkins family.

Margo became assistant director of the Boston Public Library and then a supervisor of public services at the University of Michigan. In 1997, Margo returned to Massachusetts as the director of the W. E. B. Du Bois Library at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She made it her job to merge the future with the past, making the library more user-friendly by installing new computer stations on the main level so the public could use a then-new research tool, the Internet. After her seven-year tenure during which she instituted other reforms, Margo retired and Joe had a stroke. After the stroke, Margo became Joe’s caregiver. It was a role she filled with affection and respect for her partner, and for the many generations of the Hopkins family who loved her.

After Joe’s death in 2007, Margo resumed traveling, including to the Middle East, Peru, the Galapagos Islands, Africa, the annual Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, Ontario, and the Shaw Festival at Niagara-on-the-Lake. Music was a sustaining joy, from Boston Symphony Orchestra concerts at Tanglewood to singing with the local chorus. Margo was always on the move—from Jazzercise and yoga to daily walks with her neighbor’s dog, Lassie.

Margo is survived by her sister Judith (Robert) Whaley; her nephews Christopher (Kim Phan) Robertson, Richard (Diane) Whaley, Alan Whaley, and Philip (Frances) Whaley; their children Ava Robertson, Rachel Whaley, Chaii Whaley, and Jordan Whaley; Joseph Hopkins’ sons Mark, Stephen, Martin, and Michael, daughter Susan, 16 grandchildren, and 15 great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents, her life partner Joseph Hopkins, a sister Caroline Crist, a brother Kenneth “Ken” Crist who was a Vietnam casualty, and a nephew Ryan Robertson.

A celebration of Margo’s life will be held at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, August 27, 2022, at Baalmann’s Mortuary, Atwood, followed by inurnment in Fairview Cemetery, Atwood. For information or condolences visit www.baalmannmortuary.com