Mary Lou Martino-Hahn

Mother, Educator, and Keeper of her Brothers and Sisters

Mama, an “original” in every sense of the word, was born the only daughter of Louis and

Mary Martino on September 22, 1946 at St. Joseph’s Hospital. From an early age, she had a flair for high school drama and speech, reading anything she could get her hands on, and befriending those who needed it the most. Mama was a very proud “Mercy Girl,” graduating from Mercy High School in 1964. She went on to attend the University of Nebraska-Omaha and completed her Bachelor of Education in 1968. She began her teaching career at Rosewater Elementary School that same year, and for the next 51 years – until Covid – was an elementary school and substitute teacher for Omaha Public Schools.

Mama devoted her professional career to teaching students in Omaha’s most underserved communities, at schools including Clifton Hill, J.P. Lord, Jefferson, Miller Park and King Elementary, among others. There was rarely a place we could go in Omaha without her being recognized by a current or former student. She was often given some of the highest-need students to help in a school, those other teachers had given up on, only to make them feel like there was something special in all of them. Her rationale for this was simple – “People will forget many things about you, but they’ll always remember how you made them feel.”

As devoted an educator as Mama was, she was an even more devoted mother to me. She sacrificed for her only son, Scottie, throughout his life until she no longer could. From taking her son and friends to wrestling matches, movies, and Peony Park, to working as a home tutor after teaching during the day to pay for my braces, to volunteering for PTA, to helping me confront my stutter with courage and grace when I was 20, and much, much more, she gave all of herself to the role of mother. Mama shared in my highest highs and lowest lows, saw me at my shining best and ugliest worst, and never wasted an opportunity to talk about me to anyone who was willing to listen. She brought out the best in me, and always told me that I needed to do that more for others as well.

Mama was a self-professed “clothes horse,” bragging often that she could go at least a month

without wearing the same outfit twice to school. Her many loves included a large collection of designer shoes, cold watermelon and 7-Up on hot summer days, going to local spaghetti dinners, crossword puzzles, dancing to the accordion music of Johnny Ray Gomez with my dad, Michael Landon in anything, Elvis Presley concerts, Hallmark Channel holiday specials, true crime novels, walking at the Westroads Mall, and volunteering at the Creighton Medical Center. Yet, her greatest love of all – what she was best at – was humbling herself in service to others.

When I had countless severe asthma attacks as a child, it was her who took me to the hospital ER for immediate attention. When I struggled with learning concepts in school, it was her standing over me at the Willa Cather Library for countless hours making sure I was keeping up with my grade level. When we were looking for my first car in high school, it was her who cried hardest when she couldn’t afford the sticker price. When I had to repeat 2nd grade from too many absences due to asthma attacks, it was her who worked countless hours with me to ensure I would move on to 3rd grade.

When I moved away and into my first apartment, it was her routinely stopped over during the day to clean, make sure I had plenty of food in the fridge, and left me extra money to help make ends meet. When I confronted my stutter, it was her I wrote the letter to my sophomore in college after I could no longer take hiding it from others. Upon reading this letter, she called me, we cried for a good hour or so, then she got to work on finding me speech therapy.

When my father told her he had Stage-5 colorectal cancer in 2007, it was her who called and told me, then searched down Drs. Logge and Foster at Creighton Medical Center to perform the 18-hour surgery that saved his life for 16 more years. When he had multiple rounds of chemotherapy and radiation, it was her who made sure I was there to hold his hand or call him after treatment. When he had to go to the hospital numerous times following his surgery, it was usually her who went to his bedside and made sure he was being cared for. When he needed someplace to live, it was her who suggested that he come to live with me.

When my uncle became homeless in 2003, it was her who walked with him for the next 12 years through every nursing home and social worker in Omaha to make sure he had housing. During my grandma’s 22 years on the kidney dialysis machine, it was her who spoke to every doctor, was there for every surgery, took grandma to countless restaurants for dinners, and bought her the best clothes and scarfs to look good while on dialysis. When my grandfather broke his hip and spent the summer of 2001 in the hospital, it was her who went to his bedside every day after teaching summer school to ensure his hip and bed sores were cared for.

If Mama was your advocate, you didn’t need anyone else in your corner. She did all of the above and much more without an audience or applause. Maybe most important, she did it for those who could never pay her back.

Near the end of her life, Mama was diagnosed with dementia. This disease slowly dimmed the light of what I knew and know to be the brightest soul I will ever meet. And yet, in spite of not having all the faculties she used so beautifully in the service of others during her life, she never lost her sharp wit, dark sense of humor, short temper with people she didn’t think were up to snuff, and compassion for others in need. She saved all of the memorabilia from St. Jude Children’s Hospital for donations she made, and never failed to mention that I needed to “shush up” and pay attention whenever a St. Jude commercial aired on tv.

I lost my best friend, confidant, tireless advocate, and lifelong teacher all at once. She was the first call I made to share my best and worst news, to confirm I made it safely to my destinations, or to simply vent about whatever was on my mind. Now, that daily call(s) is gone, and the enormous hole left is hard to overstate.

During her last couple years Mama had a few more lessons to teach me before she left, and those will remain between us. But rest assured that her timing was perfect, even in death. When home hospice told me that it was looking more and more like she might leave on my birthday, Mama overheard them in bed. I knew better than for anyone to tell her when she should leave anywhere. She left on her watch – the day after my birthday.

The day before she left us, Annette our hospice nurse called me as she was walking to her car in my driveway. She said that I had to come quick and see what she found – two sticks laying just the way they were in front of my porch. Below is the picture of the two little sticks that Annette sent to me, and exactly as I found them outside my door as well.

Luke 14: 12-14: 12 Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. 13 But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, 14 and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Your life and works on this earth were our banquet to those who knew and loved you. The people you invited to your banquet were the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and they could not repay you. Now, as the true keeper of your brothers and sisters – humbling yourself in the service of others – you will be blessed and repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.

Godspeed Mama. May I live a life worthy of sitting at your eternal banquet.