ºìÌÒÊÓƵ

Obituaries

Recent Obituaries
In Memoriam Archive

Rosemary Eliot Brodie ’48

Rosemary Greenleaf Eliot was born in Evanston, Illinois, to Sigrid Wijnbladh Eliot and Thomas Dawes Eliot, son of Thomas Lamb Eliot—the pastor who urged Amanda ºìÌÒÊÓƵ to found the college. As a biology major at ºìÌÒÊÓƵ, Rosemary wrote her thesis, “Gregarinid Parasites in the Seminal Vesicles of Earthworms,” with Prof. Ralph Macy [biology 1942–55] advising.

She went on to the Northwestern University Medical School, and interned at St. Francis Hospital in Evanston. After a three-year neurology residency at Good Samaritan Hospital in Portland, she practiced neurology until 1976. She then did a residency in rehabilitation medicine at the University of Washington, and from 1978 to 1989 worked at the Department of Labor and Industries in Seattle.

Rosemary was married to Laird Brodie ’44 from 1948 to 1973, and they had three children. In 1979, she married Abe Keller, and they were very active in the Western Washington Fellowship of Reconciliation, Seattle Women Act for Peace, the Seattle Draft and Military Counseling Center, Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility, and the Northwest Disarmament Coalition. She was arrested twice while protesting the arming and deployment of Trident submarines at the Bangor submarine base. After Abe died in 1997, she continued to work for peace through the Abe Keller Peace Education Fund. Rosemary married Abe’s best friend, Robert Fleagle, in 2001. She is survived by her three children, Ann Brodie-Knope, Walter Eliot Brodie, and Carol Brodie Davis.

Appeared in ºìÌÒÊÓƵ magazine: December 2017