Mary Louise Campbell | Museum supervisor, 83

Mary Louise Thomas Campbell, 83, of Burholme, retired supervisor of the Ryerss Museum and Library in Northeast Philadelphia, died Tuesday, Jan. 10, at Nazareth Hospital of complications from a stroke.

After Mrs. Campbell and her husband, Lawrence, moved to Burholme in the early 1960s, she became fascinated with the history of the Ryerss Museum and Library in nearby Burholme Park and began volunteering there, her son Alan said.

Mrs. Campbell became an expert on the history of the property, her son said, and she joined the Ryerss staff in 1973. She was staff supervisor for many years until retiring in 1993.

Ryerss Museum and Library is owned by the city and maintained by the Fairmount Park Commission. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is free to the public.

Built as a summer retreat by Joseph Ryerss in 1859, the museum displays exotic objects collected by the family in the original house and in galleries designed by noted architect Horace Trumbauer in 1921. The library is on the second floor.

Mrs. Campbell's background was more modest than that of the Ryerss family she came to know so well. She grew up on an egg farm in Fairfax County, Va.

She and her future husband met in Washington, where she was working for the U.S. Treasury Department. They married in 1949 and moved to Philadelphia when he took a job as a copy boy at The Inquirer. He eventually became an Inquirer staff writer and was later a staff writer at the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin before becoming a deputy managing director for Philadelphia.

Mrs. Campbell focused on her home and family and was a "fanatical reader," her son, an Inquirer copy editor, said.

In addition to her husband and son, Mrs. Campbell is survived by sons Robert and Thomas; and five grandchildren.

A service is private.