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Obituary: Carol Thompson / A mom who loved everyone's children
Sunday, August 06, 2000 By Mark Roth, Assistant Managing Editor, Post-Gazette
Carol Thompson wasn't like the other moms in the neighborhood.
When her three children were growing up in Park Place in the '60s and '70s, she would bundle them off to "blue slide" park on Beechwood Boulevard, and while other mothers chatted or watched their children, Mrs. Thompson would race around the grounds, playing tag and hide-and-seek.
Or she would pack nine neighborhood children into her white Volkswagen Beetle and drive them to the skating rink in Edgewood. Or she would create a stage in the basement of her home, complete with curtains she had made, so children could put on plays for each other and their parents.
Mrs. Thompson, who had battled gastric cancer for four years, died Thursday in St. Francis Medical Center in Lawrenceville. She was 64.
In the years when the Thompson household was a combination of Romper Room and Grand Central Station, her daughter, Jean Bird, recalled that their home was a place where everyone was welcome. "There were a lot of kids who didn't have good home lives, but my parents -- my mom especially -- always accepted them as they were, and many of them have stayed in touch with her over the years."
She was born Carol Joan Johnston on Jan. 20, 1936. She met her future husband, Bob Thompson, when both were growing up in Highland Park. "I was in first grade at Fulton Elementary, and Carol came into the kindergarten, and I said to myself, 'There's a pretty neat looking girl,' " he remembered.
While they remained fast friends through their elementary and high school years, they didn't begin dating each other until both had enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh.
They were married in February 1958 shortly after Mrs. Thompson graduated from Pitt. That year, they went to France so Bob Thompson could fulfill his active duty requirements in the Air Force. That was also where he learned just how determined his wife was to keep up her musical skills.
"We lived on the fifth floor of an apartment building in a little village called Chateau Roux," he recalled, "and of course, Carol wanted a piano. I remember the day when five Frenchmen who had been liberally plied with wine took that piano up the stairs. I expected a disaster, but they got it up there. Needless to say, we left it there for the next tenant."
The piano may have stayed behind, but Mrs. Thompson never stopped trying to perfect her playing. Besides accompanying the choir and musical plays at her church, she often was invited to play the piano at local social and philanthropic events.
The Thompsons joined Waverly United Presbyterian Church at Forbes and Braddock avenues in the early '60s, and Mrs. Thompson soon became one of its most active leaders.
Her husband, who retired six years ago as chairman and CEO of Ketchum Inc., recalled that his wife's "continuing refrain" through their years at the church was "Bob, we need ...."
"She'd say, 'Bob, we need to have some activities for young people here,' and we'd start a youth group." The same refrain also led the Thompsons to create a puppet ministry, and to revive the tradition of putting on an annual musical play at the church, an event that has now been under way for nearly 30 years.
Mrs. Thompson coordinated all of those "opera house" performances, as well as composing parody lyrics for songs and playing the piano.
One longtime friend, Carolyn Osmond of Regent Square, remembers that there were many amateur thespians over the years who were convinced they would never remember their lines or could never sing in front of people.
"One of her greatest gifts was getting people to do something like that for the first time," Osmond recalled. "I loved that about her -- that she wanted people to succeed."
Mrs. Thompson also was active at Waverly Church as a Sunday school teacher, elder and choir member.
And no matter what she was involved in, she also took command of the fun.
The Thompson home was filled with gag gifts, props and costumes, and she was known as the only church member likely to have a set of chattering teeth in her purse.
In fact, in the years when the Thompsons' social obligations would take them to "another dull, stand-around cocktail party," her husband recalled, "Carol always had a timer and a list of movie titles in her purse in case there was a chance to organize everyone into a game of charades."
Mrs. Thompson also used her knack for making a game out of life with her children, her son Ken recalled.
"I wasn't a morning person, so she started this game called 'Got you last' to get me out of bed in the morning. She'd tag me and say 'Got you last' and then jump out of the way when I tried to get her back, and by that time, I'd be halfway out of bed." The running tag game became a lifelong contest.
Mrs. Thompson had an intense interest in local history, and in the last 15 years, she was able to capitalize on it by volunteering as a docent at the Frick Art & Historical Center and at Clayton, the restored Penn Avenue mansion of the former steel magnate.
Mrs. Thompson also was a perfectionist, and her twin impulses of generosity and high standards came together in one of the last things she did before she died, said her daughter, Nancy Silverman.
About 10 years ago, her mother began giving tiny stuffed bears to people who had a new baby. She would knit sweaters for the bears and stitch on the initials of the children's first names.
Confined to her hospital bed and growing steadily weaker, Mrs. Thompson wanted to finish one last bear, for the child of a young man she had befriended during the family's summer vacations at Rehoboth Beach.
She was able to finish the sweater on her own, but her hands were too weak to stitch the initial "F" for the baby's name, and so she taught Silverman how to do it.
"When I was done," Silverman said, "I was so proud of this 'F' I had stitched and I held it up, and mom looked at it and said, 'You know, it's not quite right -- you'd better rip it out and do it again.' "
And so she did, until her mother was satisfied that in the end, everything was just right.
Besides her husband and three children, Mrs. Thompson is survived by her brothers, Murray Johnston Jr. of Old Greenwich, Conn., and Bill Johnston of Van Buren, Ark.; her stepmother, Alice Vargai; five grandchildren; and several nieces and nephews.
A memorial service will be held at 3 p.m. Saturday at Waverly Presbyterian Church, Forbes and Braddock avenues, East End. Memorial contributions may be made to the Waverly Church Music Fund, 590 S. Braddock Ave., Pittsburgh 15221-3217.
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