An October cloud passed over Cherry Grove the day she died 11 years ago (can it have been that long?). She was called the “heart and soul” of Cherry Grove and she regarded this little piece of paradise as her home. To say Maggie McCorkle was one of a kind is more than a cliché; it’s a vast understatement. There truly was no one who came even close. She was, in turns, so talented, so smart, so cute, so annoying, so passionate, so impatient, and for many here in Cherry Grove she was a wonderful enduring friend.  

Maggie also was many things in her career – actress, model, dancer, singer, and later artist and concerts manager for the Sol Hurok Organization and Columbia Artists Management  Inc. (CAMI) till she retired in 1964. She did supper clubs, stock, off-Broadway and TV. Her resume also says she could roller skate, show dogs, ride Western, and “being a Southerner have Southern dialects.”  As a dyed-in-the-wool Broadway Baby, she turned her magic out here in our great little theater as the creative spirit of the Arts Project. She appeared in literally scores of shows and revues from the 1950s to the turn of the new century. For many aspiring local talents, Maggie was both beloved mentor and muse. 

Her personal (by that we mean romantic) life was also one for the books, literally (think Patricia Highsmith). At her memorial service in December 2005, many of her former lovers read tributes, and that made for a very long ceremony indeed. Most of those women who loved her romantically continued to love her after as a dear friend, including Audrey Hartmann who lives on in the modern house they built on Sea Walk in the 1980s. It was testament to her charisma and caring soul that she charmed and challenged them even long after the romance faded.

Maggie was also our community conscience – she cared about the plovers and other indigenous birds, the dunes, the bay shoreline, the trees.  She may have been happiest in October when the breezes turned cool and the leaves turned red and yellow. In her flannel shirt and little watch cap, she walked everywhere.  Maybe she still does. 

We owe a lot of who we are and what we treasure today to Margaret Olwen McCorkle.  Thank you, dear friend.