Linda Howe 1959-2004

This is what I wrote May 2, 2004:

Thank you all for coming today.

We have gathered here to celebrate the all too-short life of Linda Sue Harden Howe. The grief we feel is for our own loss, to lose such a special woman. But we must know that she has gone to a better place, and to celebrate her; for Linda lived a full life, a storybook American Dream.

Linda grew up on a farm in Dixon, Illinois, where Midwestern values and virtues run deep. An only child, she was adored by her parents. With a large extended family, she grew up loved by many. I said her life was storybook and I meant it; she had something back then many little girls can only dream of: a pony, and 160 acres to ride him on. She and her family raised and showed Angus cattle, which made her strong in body and mind.

In high school, she was an exchange student and lived in Paris, France, for a summer. She left her farm after that to go away to university. She went to Drake University in Des Moines became a member in Chi Omega Sorority, and gained many lifelong close friends.

While still in school, Linda was already a "TV Star." She dressed up in a gorilla suit and played "Harry the Beast," for a children's show on KCCI-TV in Des Moines. That brought happiness to young and old alike, as a photo of her in costume with a smiling Governor of Iowa attests to. Though masked, her eyes show Linda was smiling in the photo, even inside that hot, hot suit.

One weekend in early 1981 she went with a college friend, Vickie, to her friend's hometown, St. Louis, Missouri. There she met Vickie's brother, Jim Howe. He fell in love the moment he saw her and they married in 1983. They went on their honeymoon to St. Pete Beach, where Linda fell in love with Florida's long beautiful beaches. Then decided then that if they could ever find work there, Florida would be their home.

They started their life together in St. Louis, where Linda first got into resturant marketing while working for Trahan, Burden, & Charles, on the Wendy's account. When Wendy's fired Trahan, the new agency, Quigley-Murphy, hired Linda. She kept the same office and desk at Wendy's and just changed business cards.

Outside work she had a sense of adventure; in the 1980s she went to flight school and obtained a private pilot's license.

After Wendy's, Linda went to work for McDonald's Hamburgers in St. Louis. After 5 years of doing that well, she was offered a promotion, and off she went to Baltimore to become Regional Marketing Manager. Two and a half years later, she was again promoted, and they were off to Chicago; and McDonald's World Headquarters. Each time, she left behind an office full of coworkers who loved her and have kept in touch all these years.

It was in Chicagoland in 1995 that Linda's son William was born. He was her pride and joy and the light of her life.

In 1998 Linda left McDonald’s for one of McDonald’s ad agencies, Frankel & Company. She had an office on Michigan Avenue in Chicago’s Loop with a view of Lake Michigan; many a Chicagoan’s American Dream.

When the dot com bust took that job away, she found herself unemployed for the first time. She seized the moment and took her family on a grand trip through America’s west: The Badlands, Mt. Rushmore, Devil’s Tower, Yellowstone National Park, The Grand Tetons, Dinosaur National Monument, Rocky Mountain National Park, even unusual places like Reptile Gardens and the South Dakota Corn Palace.

Then came a phone call one night in August 2002. Within days she was working in West Palm Beach. The family bought a wonderful place in Jupiter, and began to settle into their dream home. She went to work for Young & Rubicam in December, 2003. She was excited to be back in the hamburger business, working on the Burger King Account. She was able to take long walks on her beloved beach, as she did both Saturday and Sunday her last weekend.

Her life was as sweet as she was. It even ended right (for her). Before she lay down to sleep that fateful night I told her I loved her, and she said, “I love you, too.” She went to sleep, and never woke up. Physically, she was unaware of the valiant efforts of so many medical professionals, and of all of our grieving at her side. The doctors say the aneurysm that burst and took her could have been there for many years, perhaps since birth, and that this could have happened at any time up till now.

We were lucky to have had so much time with this wonderful woman. Rejoice in those fond memories. Seize today. Hug your kids.