Geraldine Cords

Geraldine Bronson Cords poured out her life for her family as a loving and deeply caring mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, wife, friend and coworker.

She was born April 14, 1926 and grew up as a farm girl in St. Johns and Owosso. In high school she was the "songbird" with the dance band. During World War II, she fearlessly followed her new husband, Bill Bronson, of Owosso as the Navy sent him to San Diego and Washington, D.C.

After their divorce in 1955, she raised three children alone and put them through college. She was a hospital administrator in Owosso, and a School of Public Health researcher at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. In 1963 she moved her family to East Lansing and began a 45-year career at Michigan State University, where she was an innovator and administrator who also led a drive in the 1970s to win better benefits and representation for staff.

She innovated the first organized medical records system at the MSU School of Veterinary Medicine that became a national model and led to many advances in medical research. She was then promoted to the MSU Department of Facilities Planning and Space Management as a space management coordinator.

She was a songbird all her life, and loved to sing with Judy Garland and Handel's Messiah, turning the stereo to high volume as she vacuumed and cooked. Her nature photography was exhibited at the MSU University Club. She was also an omnivorous reader who instilled a love of books and literature in all of her children, as she challenged them to reach higher and farther for a richer life, just as she did.

She took carloads of kids on bold adventures to Canada, Northern Michigan and Lake Huron. She enriched their young minds with field trips to planetariums, museums, concerts, plays and reunions on the family farm near Ovid. As skeptical neighbors shook their heads, she made an ice rink in the front yard one winter that turned drab January into a magical adventure.

In 1967 she married Al Cords, a decorated veteran of WWII who worked for Chevrolet in Flint. Al was the rock-solid, faithful and true husband she always deserved. They had 20 years together in their new home they loved in Perry. He died in 1987.

Like her three brothers and three sisters born to Al and Kittie Nichols, she was strong-willed, stubborn and fiercely protective of those she loved. She had a gift to reach the hearts of others and see beyond appearances to the love inside. She listened to troubles without judging and gave advice without admonishment.

"When we were growing up in this little family of four, she was dedicated to giving us a life that was stimulating to our intellect, nurtured our natural inborn talents and inclinations, and showed us how to be good people," said her daughter Cynthia of Oregon. "These expectations were unequivocal. She showed us the path, and made it very clear that she never considered the possibility that we would fail."

When it did happen, failure to mow the lawn, clean a room or do the dishes was greeted by the dreaded handwritten note at breakfast: "This means war!!!"

Though only 5 foot 2, "Mom on the warpath" was a force of nature nobody wanted to reckon with.

As her children grew and scattered to Arizona, Ohio and Oregon, she poured her love into grandchildren who remained close in Michigan, and made up for lost time whenever she could be reunited with the ones that got away.

She continued to work at MSU until 2008, still driving her sporty Acura by herself to Cincinnati and Lake Michigan for family visits, well into her 80s.

She is remembered for her bravery, her songs, her fierce love, her salty temper and her irrepressible sense of humor. "When we were kids, she would take us to 'ritzy' restaurants we could scarcely afford, to teach us how to behave, how to order, what glass to use. As we finished, she would pat her mouth with her napkin-then gradually stuff it into her mouth and pretend to eat it as we kids cringed with embarrassment and whispered, 'Mom, stop!,'" her son, Pete, recalled. "She loved to do things like that."

She died on Nov. 1 in memory care at Pine Gardens in Milford, Ohio.

She is survived by daughter Kristin Bronson, DeWitt, Mich.: daughter Cynthia Bronson, Ashland, Ore.; son Peter Bronson of Milford, Ohio; eight grandchildren and six great-grandchildren. Memorials may be donated to Queen City Hospice of Cincinnati.