Maude Frances Puissegur

On July 29, 1918, Maude Frances was born in New Orleans to Maud Anna Grieme (originally of Brooklyn New York) and Frank Renaud Marfese of New Orleans.

Maude attended P.G.T. Beauregard Elementary School (located at the site of today's Thurgood Marshall Magnet School) at 4500 Canal Street. She graduated from John McDonough High School in 1936 and attended stenographer school after high school.

As a child, she often went to silent movies and later talking movies, and was very fond of Greta Garbo. She and her grandmother, Lillian Hoffmeister Marfese, would take a trolley to Carrollton Theatre from home at the 4400 block of Canal Street in Mid-City, New Orleans, sometimes walking home nearly a mile down Canal Street in good weather after the movie. In 1927, before she was nine, she witnessed minor flooding in New Orleans caused by the Great Mississippi River Flood of 1927 which devastated much of the River's adjacent lands north and south of New Orleans. Still she liked the River.

She loved to skate as a child and one windy winter's day in late 1920's skated down sidewalks and Canal Street four miles to the Mississippi River to see it safely in its banks. She turned to return home north into the wind and realized how the wind, an ally going to the river, had become a bitter foe going home. She missed supper and was in trouble with her parents for that, temporarily taking their focus off her younger sister, Muriel, who was usually the one in trouble.

She also liked to swim and first saw her future husband at the pool in City Park in 1937. Her father, Frank, died tragically in 1939. His steadfast courage and belief in his faith, facing death, converted her Lutheran mother, Maud Anna, to Roman Catholicism. She married Ferdinand Arthur Puissegur of New Orleans in February 1941. They both worked, she as a stenographer/typist. When December 7, 1941 brought the U.S. into war, Ferdinand enlisted and she got a job with the U.S. Navy as a civil servant in 1942.

She accompanied her husband to several Army posts during his training, notably Ft. Hood, Texas, where she walked unknowingly through a field filled with rattlesnakes. When Ferdinand shipped out overseas to Europe, she found comfort in consoling other young women who were more visibly upset from what would be their last goodbyes for some of them. She returned to New Orleans from New York and went back to work for the U.S. Navy as a civil servant for the rest of the war. Her husband returned from Europe early in June by volunteering for the Pacific. They were spared further separation by VJ Day in August 1945. Their first son, Dennis Rivers was born in April 1946. Another son, Bryce, followed in 1950, a daughter, Mary, in 1954, and another daughter, Jean Anne, in 11/1959. Although she worked as a stenographer/typist for insurance agencies in the 1960s and 1970s, her life was focused on her kids. She also worked as a legal secretary for Stanley Levin of Goldman and Levin Law Offices from the late 70's to 1989.

She had a lifelong appreciation for music. She could sing very well and played piano before arthritis struck. She was a member of St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church congregation where her four children attended grammar school in succession from 1951 to 1974. She sang in the church choir and contributed to a couple of talent shows held by St. Anthony's in the 60's as fundraisers. Also in the 60's, she participated in Le Petite Theatre productions and had a singing role in the Sound of Music playing the part of a nun who was Maria's advocate. She also had the role of Mrs. Keller in The Miracle Worker . And in a New Orleans Recreation Department production, she was the Queen in Once Upon A Mattress .

In retirement in the 1990s, a life of ease was interrupted by the serious illness of her husband who fought a long battle with prostate cancer. Although they won a few battles with the cancer and bought some time with radiation and operations, it finally took him in February 2002 after 61 years of marriage. She was also preceded in death by her father in 1939, her mother in 1986, and her son, Dennis, on July 30, 2005 to a tragic traffic accident. Most of her many close friends also preceded her death. In September 2005, she was forced from New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, but found comfort in Georgia hospitality and the proximity of her son Bryce. Still she liked Lake Pontchartrain, especially memories of the waves crashing over the seawalls in a storm and of the blue claw crabs it provided that made their way into her incomparably delicious gumbo.

She is survived by her sister, Muriel M. Guenin, now of Seattle, WA; a niece, Stella Walker Fritzsche (Ulrich) of Seattle; son, Bryce Abel (Linda) of Macon; daughters, Mary Lupo (Robert) of New Orleans, and Jean Anne Thomas (Mark) of Metairie, LA; grandchildren, Dennis Puissegur (Erin) of New Iberia, LA; Robert Thomas "Tom" Lupo (Abigail) of New Orleans; Francesca Lupo of New Orleans; Elise Gabrielle Thomas of Metairie and Christy Abel of Macon; and several great grandchildren.

Her family is very grateful to the associates and staff at Bolingreen Health and Rehabilitation Center and to all the warm, wonderful folks in Georgia that helped take care of her needs.

Maude's earthly remains will be interred in a family crypt at Lake Lawn Mausoleum in New Orleans on November 6, 2010. A memorial service with Catholic Mass will precede the interment at Lake Lawn Funeral Home. The interment in the restricted space of Inspiration Hall in the Mausoleum will be private. Lake Lawn Cemetery and Funeral Home in New Orleans is handling arrangements in New Orleans. " target="">.