Marcia McCraw Hartley

Marcia McCraw Hartley of Wayland, Massachusetts, passed away on August 16, 2024, at the age of 89. Marcia is survived by her husband of 65 years Loren Howard Hartley (“Howard”) and their four children: Anne Elizabeth Hartley, Thomas Howard Hartley, John Matthew Hartley and his wife Jennie Hartley, and Joseph Andrew Hartley and his wife Diane Bromberg. She also leaves eight grandchildren and one great-grandchild. 

Marcia and her siblings were raised in Bolivar, Missouri, by their parents Doyle and Nancy McCraw. Marcia was pre-deceased by her sister Virginia Moran and her brother John McCraw. She attended Bolivar public schools and graduated from the University of Missouri in 1958 with a degree in nursing where she was on the honor roll and chosen to be a member of the honor society Mortar Board. 

After graduation, she began working as a ward nurse where she met Howard. On March 1, 1959, they married and moved to Dallas, Texas, where she worked as a pediatric nurse. Her first child, Anne, was born in 1960. Marcia continued to pursue her nursing career in Missouri, while caring for her growing family. In 1967, they lived in Stockholm, Sweden, during her husband’s research fellowship year. They moved to Massachusetts where Howard entered the U.S. Army and worked at Harvard Medical School hospitals, while Marcia’s career expanded into the field child life. Child life specialists are trained to care for children and parents in hospitals and other healthcare settings.

Marcia dedicated her life to serving others, and she had a special love for children. She earned a master’s degree at Wheelock College in Early Childhood Development. Marcia was a founding faculty member of Wheelock College’s Child Life program, the first program of its kind in the United States. She loved taking graduate students to visit hospitals in London in the Wheelock College Child Life summer program. She worked at Wheelock until she retired in 2000. 

In the 1980s, Marcia helped to manage the Boston Infant Health and Development Center, which was part of a nationwide study of the impact of early intervention (home-visits and center-based care) on the childhood development of low-birth-weight infants. 

Marcia attended the Episcopal Church in college and was married at Calvary Church in Columbia, Missouri. She was active at the Church of the Holy Spirit in Wayland, Massachusetts, for decades, serving on the Vestry and as Senior Warden. She and Howard attended Trinity Church in Boston, and most recently St. Anne’s-in-the-Fields in Lincoln, Massachusetts. 

Inquisitive and creative, Marcia loved art, genealogy, gardening, sewing, reading, and traveling. She served as a docent at the Davis Museum at Wellesley College. 

 A service to celebrate her life will be held on Saturday, September 28, 2024, at 10AM at St. Anne' s-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church, 147 Concord Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts. 

 In lieu of flowers, the family invites you to give to St. Anne’s-in-the-Fields by mail at P.O. Box 6, Lincoln, MA 01773 or https://www.stanneslincoln.org/give (one-time gift, memorial gift). 

 Arrangements under the care of Concord Funeral Home, 74 Belknap Street, Concord, MA 01742  978-369-3388 www.concordfuneral.com