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San Diego’s First Mary Marston
The Marstons: A California Family - Part 24
By Robin Lakin
May/June 2026
 George Phillips and Harriette White Marston, circa 1859, shortly before moving from their remote cabin and farm in Wisconsin’s Koshkonong territory to a new life in Fort Atkinson. There George P. built a successful mercantile and Italianate home in 1860. Courtesy SOHO |
Born on April 13, 1853, in the cabin her papa had built a few years prior, Mary White Marston soon became her big brother George White Marston's first playmate and confidant. Children of George Phillips Marston and Harriette White Marston, they kept each other and their mother company on their isolated farm in Wisconsin.
The next three years brought more change into George and Mary’s young lives. Lilla Gilman Marston, a new baby sister arrived for them to help watch over and play with, and the family moved to the town of Fort Atkinson. There, their father George P. opened his successful mercantile and built their grand, new Italianate home, where the Marston children would spend their formative years.
Mary, while enjoying a visit to Newburyport, Massachusetts at age eight, charmed grandfather Stephen Marston by singing to him in his office each morning. In a letter, he wrote of Mary: “We are enjoying her visit highly, she is a little darling—bright, intelligent, quiet, behaves like a little lady. Most inquisitive, nothing escapes her notice, wants to know about everything. She is as happy as a bird and the most industrious little creature I ever saw. She really works in sewing, knitting, etc.”
 A poised young Mary White Marston wearing a hoopskirt in 1859, when her Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin teachers called for a ban on this foundation garment (worn under shorter skirts), declaring it “immodest.” We know not if Mary was a rebel who continued to flaunt a hoop ‘neath her skirt and petticoats. Courtesy SOHO |
 A young man, most likely George White Marston, stands on the front porch of the Italianate home built in the early 1860s by his father, George Phillips Marston, on Merchant Avenue, Fort Atkinson. He gestures toward another man who is likely his father, just prior to the family moving to San Diego, c. 1870. Courtesy SOHO |
 Mary White Marston, in 1872, about the time she graduated from the Rockford Female Seminary before moving to San Diego to join her parents and brother, George W. Courtesy SOHO |
 San Diego’s only residence designed by Pasadena architects Greene & Greene was constructed on Sixth Avenue in 1912 for Mary White (née Marston) and Michael Kew. The Arts and Crafts-era home featured a roof meant to resemble thatch and boasted a tennis court. The house was demolished in the 1950s for an apartment building. Courtesy San Diego History Center |
After the Civil War, George attended Illinois’ Beloit Academy, a boys’ school, while Mary went to its sister school, the Rockford Female Seminary. Jane Addams, founder of the American Settlement House movement, would also graduate from the seminary and become the mentor of Mary’s future nieces, Mary and Helen Marston, who together established San Diego’s Neighborhood House in 1914 to assist Mexican immigrants transitioning into the San Diego Community.
Arriving in San Diego in 1872, Mary took an immediate liking to the town and enjoyed life in the little house they called “The Gables,” furnished with a rosewood square grand piano. Playing the piano gave Mary immense pleasure, while Lilla sang and George entertained the family with campy acting, parlor tricks, and impersonations.
Brought up in the Christian Congregationalist Church, Mary traveled in 1876 to Honolulu, where she taught for two years at Punahou College, founded by Protestant missionaries in the 1840s.
In 1878, she gained a sister-in-law when her brother George married Anna Lee Gunn. Shortly afterward, their mother Harriette took Lilla back east. Throughout their lengthy absence, Mary lived with George and Anna Lee, assisting with the birth and care of her first niece and namesake, Mary Gilman Marston.
Mary White Marston was a professional-level pianist and organist; frequent performer in San Diego’s theaters, and a dedicated member of the Amphion Club, which brought internationally recognized performing artists to San Diego. She took an active role alongside Anna Lee in the local History Club, Wednesday Club, Floral Association, and a multitude of charitable projects.
Mary wed Canadian attorney Michael Kew in 1886 and raised three children—William, Richard, and Margaret. Though they were cousins, Mary, George and Lilla’s children were as close as siblings.
In 1912, Mary and Michael Kew purchased a large plot of land at Sixth and Spruce Streets fronting the west mesa of Balboa Park, near her brother George Marston and sister Lilla Burnham’s new homes on Seventh Avenue. The couple commissioned Charles and Henry Greene, Pasadena’s master architects, to design the sole Greene & Greene home ever built in San Diego.
This architecturally significant Arts and Crafts home—like so many of San Diego’s important structures—was demolished in the 1950s to make way for an apartment building. This huge loss forever altered the neighborhood landscape and robbed San Diego of a cultural treasure.
Fortunately, Mary’s niece, Mary Gilman Marston, the last of George and Anna Lee’s children to live in the Marston House, protected it for us and all who follow to admire, learn from, and enjoy. Through her gift of the Marston House and its gardens to the City of San Diego, we can continue to share the rich legacy and historic preservation successes of the Marston family members who shaped San Diego and beyond.
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