Southwest Greensburg woman had heart of gold, killer card-playing instincts
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If David and Patrick Leonard got into trouble, they could expect to revisit it later in the week.
“My father was a long-distance truck driver,” said David Leonard of Greensburg. “One thing I always remember is, if we got into trouble, my mother took care of it, but you got it again when Dad came home.”
His brother agreed.
“With four boys and being by herself a lot, she had to take charge,” said Patrick Leonard of Randolph, N.J. “And she did.”
Margaret L. “Peg” Leonard of Southwest Greensburg died Monday, Feb. 24, 2020. She was 100.
Mrs. Leonard was born Oct. 5, 1919, in Greensburg, a daughter of the late Tony and Edith (Rupp) Ficco. She was a graduate of Greensburg High School and worked at Zanarini’s Posey Shoppe in Jeannette.
“She grew up on Pittsburgh Street just below the hospital,” David Leonard said. “Not that Dad didn’t raise us, but she had us seven days a week and took us everywhere we needed to go. We were all altar boys, so, if she wasn’t taking us to church, she was taking us other places.”
Mrs. Leonard met her husband, the late Edwin L. Leonard, through his sister.
“They lived over on Spring Street and, one time, when my mom was visiting Catherine, she and my dad met,” Patrick Leonard said. “It was probably in high school because she married my dad when she was 21.”
The couple were married Aug. 1, 1940, and, shortly afterward, Mr. Leonard was sent to Chicago with the Navy in preparation for deployment to Japan during World War II.
“She would travel by train to see him in Chicago,” David Leonard said. “Eventually he did deploy, but as he was on his way overseas the war ended.”
When she wasn’t driving her boys from place to place, Mrs. Leonard enjoyed playing cards.
“She was in multiple card clubs her whole life,” David Leonard said. “Her problem was she kept outliving everyone else in the card clubs.”
And she was good.
“She had a mind like a steel trap,” Patrick Leonard said. “Even 80 years on, she could remember things from when she was in her 20s. I think that was why she was such a good card player. We used to say that, after two or three tricks were played, she knew more about your hand than you did.”
While her boys typically thought of her as a strict disciplinarian, to friends and the community she was known as a kind, generous person.
“She really had a heart of gold,” Patrick Leonard said. “Everyone has told us how much they looked forward to seeing her and talking with her over the years.”
Unless, of course, you were across from her at the card table.
“Bridge, gin rummy — she played all sorts of different things,” Patrick Leonard said. “And she’d whip you.”
Mrs. Leonard is survived by four sons, Edwin “Jerry” Leonard of Springfield, Va., David Leonard of Greensburg, Patrick Leonard of Randolph, N.J., and Thomas J. Leonard of Mantua, N.J.; daughter-in-law Deborah Teacher Jenkins, of Wooster, Ohio; nine grandchildren; 12 great-grandchildren; and brother Donald Ficco of Greensburg.
Friends will be received from 4 to 8 p.m. Friday at Leo M. Bacha Funeral Home, 516 Stanton St., Greensburg.
Prayers will be at 9 a.m. Saturday at the funeral home, with a 9:30 a.m. funeral Mass at Blessed Sacrament Cathedral in Greensburg. Interment will follow in Greensburg Catholic Cemetery.