BRUNSWICK — Mary Breese Lipovsky, 84, resident of Casco Road in Brunswick died Sunday, December 25, 2011 at the Vicarage by the Sea in Harpswell following a long illness. She was born January 7, 1927 in New York City, NY a daughter of Jefferson M. and Hetsel A. (Wilson) Hartill. As a child, Mary had lived in New York, New Jersey, Florida and Maine but graduated from Brunswick High School in 1945 and received a nursing degree from Maine General Hospital.

Mary worked as a Registered Nurse in Kansas, Maryland and at the hospital in Bath, ME retiring from nursing in 1966. In 1949, she met and married her husband Louis J. Lipovsky in Kansas. They moved to the Washington D.C. area where their oldest daughter Sharon was born in 1952, and then moved to Maine permanently in the late 1950s.

Mary was a longtime member of the Brunswick United Methodist Church, was a founding member of the Brunswick Farmers Market Association and a longtime volunteer for RESPITE.

Mary loved working in her flower and vegetable gardens and in her two greenhouses. She was known locally as the African Violet Lady in the 1970s and 1980s when she sold African Violets and other houseplants. Mary and Louis raised high bush blueberries to sell at the Brunswick Farmers Market as part of Lipovsky Gardens. Mary also enjoyed making jams, jellies and pickles to sell. She was proficient at sewing, knitting, crocheting, quilting and cooking. She also raised chickens, rabbits and other small farm animals. After her husband died in 1993, Mary enjoyed traveling. She took many trips with her daughters Sharon and Stephanie to several U.S. National Parks and other locations across the country.

Mary was predeceased by her husband Louis J. Lipovsky and two brothers Donald and Robert Hartill.

Survivors include her daughter, Stephanie and her husband Eric Buckley of Brunswick, her daughter Sharon and her husband William Talbot of Inglewood, CA, her brother David Hartill of Brunswick, two sisters, Ruth Marks of Florida and Jessie Leitner of Connecticut and a granddaughter, Sarah Buckley of Brunswick.

Visiting hours will be held from 5 to 7 p. m. on Friday, January 6, 2012 at Brackett Funeral Home, 29 Federal Street, Brunswick. A funeral service will be held at 4 p.m. on Saturday, January 7, 2012 at the Brunswick United Methodist Church, Church Road in Brunswick. Spring Interment will be in Growstown Cemetery, Brunswick. In lieu of sending flowers, donations may be made in Mary’s memory to the Alzheimer’s Association of Maine, 383 U.S. Route 1, Suite 2C, Scarborough, ME 04074 or to the Brunswick United Methodist Church.