By Marie Kelleher, a devoted women’s and medieval history professor at Long Beach State for 21 years, died May 6 at 53-years-old.
A service to celebrate the life and work of Kelleher will be held by the College of Liberal Arts Department of History on Oct. 10 at the Anna W. Ngai Alumni Center.
Kelleher’s work as a historian centered around women, law and medieval history.
She was a published author of the award winning book The Measure of Woman: Law and Female Identity in the Crown of Aragon, a member and board member of the American Academy of Research Historians of Medieval Spain and recipient of multiple national grants and fellowships.
Before her death, Kelleher was in the process of finishing her second book, a historical story about medieval Barcelona and the impact famine had on its society and government.
Colleagues of Kelleher’s are collaborating to help get the book ready for publication in 2025.
Through her work in women’s history, Kelleher also helped to create a large network of fellow historians, colleagues and former students. She formed connections that she maintained for years with people she met and worked with.
This network is seen reflected in the outpour of individuals who reached out and contributed to an endowed reward created in her name after her passing through the American Academy of Research Historians of Medieval Spain. Neither the amount of funds nor its purpose has been finalized.
“She was very loyal. Loyal as a friend, as a daughter, sister,” Thomas Barton, professor at the University of San Diego and a long-time colleague, said. “She didn’t have a huge ego, she’s self deprecating, she’s humble, she’s willing to lay it all out there.”
Barton described Kelleher as an individual always willing to help others, yet also able to ask for help herself. She never took herself too seriously and was able to lightly joke about herself.
Kelleher impacted many people throughout her life, managing to leave a mark on others in even the slightest of ways.
“I’m sure there’s a lot of people there that knew her as the woman with the crazy hair who biked around, did yoga and loved to hang out at coffee shops,” Barton said. “She’s like a force of nature.”
Photo credit: Dr. Caitlin Murdock
Something Kelleher shared with those close to her during her final days, was her hope to above all be remembered as a kind person.
“It said something about who she was. An accomplished scholar, a dedicated instructor, an outstanding colleague, but the thing that she wanted to be remembered for is something that transcends who we are as instructors,” David Shafer, Chair of CSULB’s Department of History, said. “And that was reflected in the comments, almost universally, that undergrad and graduate students alike wrote about her.”
One of the last things Kelleher had done before passing away was attend a graduate workshop she had been invited to speak at.
“She was ill enough that it became clear that [attending] wasn’t possible, but she did it by Zoom,” Caitlin Murdock, colleague and close friend of Kelleher, said. “She was really very ill, but she spent an entire day on Zoom doing this, not telling them that there was anything wrong, just that she couldn’t travel.”
Many of Kelleher’s friends shared similar memories of the late professor’s character. At her core, Marie Kelleher was a mentor, a friend and a passionate coffee lover. She loved food and was a vegetarian always looking for the fresh new thing, a bicycle enthusiast, an amateur photographer and a proud Portland Oregonian. She was someone who went out of her way to be there for others.
