Margaret "Peggy" Bean
November 18, 1929 - September 13, 2021
Obituary
Margaret “Peggy” Bean
Margaret Louise “Peggy” Bean (Cochrane) of Seattle passed away on September 13, 2021, at age 91 with her daughter by her side after a sudden illness. Peggy was born November 18, 1929, in Juneau, Alaska. She was the daughter of the late Margaret E. (Schrink) and Hugh L. Cochrane and the stepdaughter of the late George F. Titrington.
Peggy had a life-long connection with Alaska, from its early territorial years through the many key political and natural events in its history. Her childhood home was the early boom town of Douglas, Alaska. She and her family survived the devastating Douglas fire of 1937, and she grew up with now-prominent Alaskan families and formative state legislators. In her teens, her family moved to Clinton, MD, where she graduated from high school. The family then moved to the Seattle area, where she completed business college and worked as a telephone operator. She married Robert H. “Bob” Bean on July 22, 1950, at a family home in Port Orchard, WA, and they moved to pre-statehood Juneau, Alaska in 1951, because Bob’s Seattle-based company figured they could finally retain a representative in that geographically challenging state if the spouse already had strong ties there. The family then moved to Anchorage in 1953 and returned to Seattle in 1955 for a new business adventure near Pike Place Market. In 1960, Alaska (now a state) beckoned again, and the family moved back to Anchorage, establishing a strong home base in the new Turnagain Heights development. Peggy and her three young children were inside their Turnagain bluff home in the early evening of March 1964 when an earthquake — common in Anchorage — suddenly became the 9.2-magnitude Good Friday Earthquake. The land under their home collapsed and the house began sliding toward Cook Inlet. Always cool in a crisis and true to her instincts as a survivor, when the house and ground stopped moving, Peggy shepherded all the kids and several neighbors through the upheaval of broken up homes, pillars of dirt, and dangerous electrical lines to safety on level, high ground. Temporarily without a home, the family was on the first plane to Seattle after the earthquake, but they returned to Anchorage that summer and continued to thrive in the Turnagain area for many years to come.
Peggy worked as an accounting clerk in the shipping industry in Anchorage — first at SmYth and then at Sea-Land Service until her children left for colleges in the lower 48. As a retired member of Alaska Teamsters Local 959 in 1986, she moved to Seattle to be with her daughter and grandson and managed the Joseph Apartments until her second retirement in 2015.
No matter where she lived, Alaska was always close to Peggy’s heart. Her home was filled with Alaskan art, memorabilia, and books (she knew some of the historical characters!). She happily traveled on three cruises to Alaska in her later years, at one point providing a taxi driver — and her daughter — with an impressive historical tour of the Juneau-Douglas area, while the driver tried to take copious notes for future tourists. She was a devoted grandmother, a masterful Christmas treat-maker, an avid bridge-player, and a reader of mysteries and science-fiction, a love that she passed on to her children. Peggy was a devout Lutheran and member of Lutheran Church of Hope in Anchorage and Faith Lutheran Church and its Ruth Circle in Seattle. She particularly valued her Faith community and the church’s many good works.
Peggy is survived by her sister Carol Austin (Donald, deceased) and brother Edward Cochrane (Linda); her children James Bean (Christina), Barbara Cochrane, and Richard Bean (Jeanne Lew); and her grandson Sean Loveys (Valerie, deceased), her granddaughter Alicia Bean, her great grandson Charles Jolin; and many beloved nieces and nephews. In addition to her parents, she was predeceased by her young brother William “Billy” Cochrane.
A service and celebration of Peggy’s life will be held next year at Faith Lutheran Church. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to Faith Lutheran Church’s Faith Family Fund (8208 18th Ave NE, Seattle, WA 98115; faithseattle.org/giving).
