If you listen carefully you will hear the sounds of celebration from Fiddlers’ Green – the sound of Margaret Chubbuck Duff joining her late husband Peter, who predeceased her in 2008. Maggie left this world for her next great adventure on Boxing Day 2015. Following two strokes in 2008, Maggie (and consequently her family and friends) were afforded a seven year reprise until a third stroke ushered her onward.
Maggie was born in 1934 and grew up in Rockland and South Weymouth, spending her summers in Wellfleet. She was a 1956 graduate of Tufts University where she and Peter met and where she majored in Art History and minored in Fine Art at the Museum School. Following her graduation, Maggie applied her discerning eye and organizational diligence working for author Richard ‘Diggory’ Venn, and for then-gallerist and architect Nat Saltonstall. After Peter’s graduation from Tufts and the arrival of their children, Maggie focused her efforts on managing the Duff household and supporting Peter in the establishment of his boatbuilding business, Edey & Duff in Mattapoisett. When her brood fledged, she continued her earlier education, earning a degree in Graphic Design from the Swain School of Design, and applied the skills she developed there with positions at GHR Engineering and the Zeiterion Theater, both in New Bedford, and Abacus Architects in Wareham.
Maggie’s personal pursuits included fiber arts, teaching weaving for a number of years, and being quite skilled at sewing and knitting; she was a trail-blazer in nutrition, preparing, serving and enjoying what was to become the paleo diet years before it was popular; traveling with Peter and their children, either delivering boats Peter had built or sailing in far-away waters; and the warm company of family and friends.
Underlying all of this, and perhaps Maggie’s crowning achievement is the grace and fortitude with which she helped Peter navigate 40 years of Parkinson’s disease as an interloper in their marriage.
Maggie is survived by sisters Mary Louise ‘Mou’ Garrett and husband Kenneth, and Martha Rosewell; son Ian Duff and wife Kathryn; daughter Jane Gleason and husband Bob; and five grandchildren, Storey, Ansel and Haines Duff, and Gordon and Henry Gleason. There will be a memorial service in the spring or early summer, when the Coreopsis is in bloom. In lieu of flowers or other thoughtful remembrances, please feel free to make a donation in Maggie’s name to the American Stroke Association, 7272 Greenville Avenue, Dallas, TX 75231, www.strokeassociation.org, 1 (888) 478-7653. Arrangements were by the Saunders-Dwyer Mattapoisett Home for Funerals, 50 County Rd., Route 6, Mattapoisett. For online condolence book, please visit www.saundersdwyer.com.