Mary Ruth Kent Jacoby

BROWNSVILLE, TX. – Mary Ruth Kent Jacoby, age seventy-five, was born to Ray and Avis Kent in Des Moines, Iowa, on November 30,1948, and died in Brownsville, Texas at her winter home of ovarian cancer on Monday, the 25th of March 2024. A private family memorial service will be held in Brownsville and a Celebration of Life remembering Mary will be held in Walker, Minnesota at eleven o’clock in the morning on Saturday, the 27th of July 2024, at Hope Lutheran Church, 305 10th Street S, Walker, Minnesota 56484, with a visitation an hour before the service.

She graduated from Abraham Lincoln High School, Des Moines, Iowa, in 1966. Her greatest achievement there was being selected to All State Chorus. Even though she was an alto and did not get to sing the fun parts, she loved the experience of taking part in something so large and beautiful. Music was a big part of Mary’s upbringing. Her father was choir director at Grace Baptist Church, and it was a forgone conclusion that all four of his children would learn to read music and play an instrument. She was a self-taught pianist.

When she was eighteen, Mary moved to Denver, Colorado and started working for Hilton Reservation Service in the Denver Hilton Hotel. She loved that job and over the years, she worked in sales, marketing and banking in Colorado and Minnesota. In Denver she met and married the first of three great loves of her life. Steven Markwood and Mary were married on July 18, 1970. They were blessed with two children, Stacie Markwood Boggs, and Brian Kent Markwood. That union ended in divorce. Mary moved to Redwood Falls, Minnesota, in August of 1981 and within a short time met and fell in love with Peter Simmons. They married on January 2, 1982, and welcomed a son, Andrew Simmons Jacoby. Tragically, two weeks after Andrew was born, Peter was killed in a car accident. And finally, she married Jerry Jacoby on December 23, 1984, after which Mary’s mother told her, “Now Mary, three husbands is enough. Don’t get married again.” She didn’t. Jerry and she blended a family with Jerry’s two children, Michelle Jacoby Schwartz and Steven Bruce Jacoby, joining the Markwood/Simmons brood. Jerry adopted Andrew in 1985.

Jerry and Mary enjoyed many adventures – working together on the farm, sailing on Lake Superior, and traveling on several once-in-a-lifetime trips. In 1995, they bought a beautiful property with a little cabin on Leech Lake. In 2013, they designed and built their dream home on the same property. In 2022, they bought a winter vacation home in Brownsville, Texas. 

Mary was preceded in death by numerous family members; her husband, Peter Simmons; and stepson, Steven Bruce Jacoby. 

Mary is survived by her beloved husband, Jerry; children Michelle Jacoby Schwartz and her husband Anthony Cadungog, Stacie Boggs, Brian Markwood, and Andrew Jacoby and his partner Bobbi Barron; stepsons, Troy, Todd, and Chad Simmons; grandchildren Katie, Alyssa, Cody, Blake, Ben, Caleb, and Tyler; and five great-grandchildren. Mary also leaves behind her most wonderful siblings and their spouses, Ron (Priscilla) Kent, Kathy (Larry) Smith, and Bob (Jan) Kent; and ten Kent cousins.

Mary loved to read and make people laugh.

Memories of Mary may be shared at www.darlingmouser.com.

Personalized funeral arrangements directed by Steven R. Hieu Bailey and Staff have been entrusted to the care of Darling-Mouser Funeral Home at 945 Palm Boulevard in Brownsville, Texas 78520, (956) 546-7111.