FARMINGTON — A retired Portland teacher and University of Maine at Farmington graduate gave the school its second-largest donation ever, $700,000 that will be used to support student scholarships.

When T. Margaret Brown, who lived in Westbrook, died in May at age 84 from congestive heart failure, she left more than $700,000 in her will to the UMF Endowed Scholarship Fund and to establish another scholarship fund in her name. She graduated from UMF in 1955 and spent her career teaching home economics at Portland High School and King Middle School in Portland.

T. Margaret Brown, a 1955 graduate of the University of Maine at Farmington who spent her career as a home economics teacher, donated $700,000 to the school. Photo courtesy of UMaine-Farmington

“Everybody was pretty much surprised,” said Joanne Edwards, a friend of Brown’s and the executor of her estate. “She lived pretty frugally, but it does seem like she did well. Of course, she had investments and money set aside for health reasons, thinking she might need it; and then she didn’t, so it was there for Farmington.”

Edwards’ husband, Ron, taught with Brown at King Middle School and said the donation was a final act of kindness from someone who had spent much of her life looking out for those in need, especially children.

Brown was born in Wiscasset and taught in Northeast Harbor before spending most of her career as a middle and high school teacher in Portland before retiring in the 1990s, Joanne Edwards said.

“She was very dedicated to teaching students,” she said. “She wanted to be sure they did things the right way and was very dedicated.”

One of Brown’s passions was crafts, and she was always engaged in a project, whether it was making dolls for children at the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital or knitting hundreds of pairs of hats and mittens for needy children in the winter.

She was also regularly took high school students from Portland High School to get free dental cleanings as part of a program at what was then Westbrook College and is now the University of New England, Edwards said.

Brown never married and had no children. Her only surviving relative is a niece, Edwards said.

“I think she always had a soft spot” for UMF, Edwards said. “She enjoyed her years there and they prepared her, though she did also get a graduate degree from the University of Maine. I think she wanted to see that students that needed the money would be able to go to school.”

A bulk of the donation, which the school received in October, will go to UMF’s endowed UMF Scholarship Fund, with the income from the fund being used to provide scholarships for incoming or current UMF students. A portion of the donation also will establish the T. Margaret Brown (Class of 1955) Scholarship Fund, which will be designated to support matriculated students from Wiscasset, Brown’s hometown.

The gift is the second-largest in UMF’s history, behind a $5 million gift an anonymous donor designated for the Emery Community Arts Center in June 2002.

Rachel Ohm can be contacted at 612-2368 or at:

rohm@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @rachel_ohm

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