Margaret Ellen Hayes

Margaret Ellen Hayes lived nearly all of her life in Portland, where she taught third grade, kept a hillside garden, and made a habit of knowing her neighbors by name. Born in 1948, she grew up walking the east-side streets with her sister and never quite lost the habit of waving at people she only half recognized. She married Daniel Hayes in 1971. They raised two children in a small house off Division Street, hosted Sunday pancakes, and spent late summers at the coast with a stack of library novels. After she retired from the Portland Public Schools, Margaret volunteered in the reading room at her parish and delivered flowers to people who could not easily leave home. Friends remember her handwritten notes, her impatience with fuss, and the way she set an extra place at the table without being asked. She died in Portland in August 2026, at peace in the city she never wanted to leave.