Jacqueline Marie Maguire

Retired administrator and world traveler, dies at 92 years old

Jacqueline Marie Maguire enjoyed traveling around the country and overseas. Courtesy

Jacqueline Marie Maguire, a former St. Martin de Porres Center administrator who was an avid traveler, died Dec. 20 at her Abingdon home. She was 92.

Her son, John Robert Maguire II, said she died in her sleep.

Born in Annapolis, she was the daughter of Maurice Peter Sternberg, a World War II Navy veteran and electrician, and Elizabeth Alice Lee, a telephone operator who became a full-time homemaker.

Mrs. Maguire worked as a Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone operator during the 1940s.

She met her future husband, John Robert Maguire, after World War II. He had served in the Navy as a Seabee (U.S. Naval Construction Battalion) and served in the Pacific and Alaska.

They settled in Baltimore and lived on Rosebank Avenue in Govans.

She became the secretary and administrator of the old Martin de Porres Center in East Baltimore where she assisted neighborhood children and others in the part of Baltimore once known as the Tenth Ward.

“She did a lot of good at the center. They helped a lot of young kids get going,” her son said.

“She was a kind, caring funny lady with a great sense of humor,” he added. “She was a great mom. She was a mom to kids who weren’t even hers. The house where I grew up was the headquarters home for after-school things in that neighborhood.”

She and her husband remained close to his military colleagues — World War II Marines and Navy veterans. They established friendships and bonds within a tight-knit group.

“My mother was a woman of immense curiosity and an adventurous spirit,” her son said. “She and my father traveled the country extensively in their RV. They explored America from coast to coast and created cherished memories together.”

They also traveled overseas to visit their son when he was working abroad for the U.S. government.

“All this fueled her love for discovery and connection,” her son said. “Her intellectual curiosity was matched only by her deep and abiding love for her family, which she held above all else.”

After years of living in Baltimore, she moved to Havre de Grace, where she joined St. Patrick Roman Catholic Church. She later relocated to Abingdon Gardens. a Catholic Charities senior community.

She is survived by her son, John Robert Maguire II, of Williamsburg, Virginia; and two granddaughters. Her husband John R. Maguire died in 2011.

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