Martha Gale Grush

Martha Gale (Glennon) Grush passed away January 27th from complications arising from a long hospitalization following surgery. She was two days past her 80th birthday.

Martha was born in Monticello, Illinois, and spent some of her childhood in Bement, Illinois, moving with her family of three brothers and a sister to Elmhurst, Illinois. She graduated from the University of Illinois as an English major and met her future husband there. For many years Martha was an art director for the Spiegel Catalog. In the late 1990s she and her husband moved to New Mexico where they opened an art gallery, Muse Image, in Santa Fe and Madrid, New Mexico. They lived on a mesa in the Ortiz Mountains near Cerrillos, New Mexico, with two dogs, a cat, and three goats. They returned to the Midwest in 2008, to the historic town of Delavan, Wisconsin, where she lived until her passing. 

She is survived by a brother, John Glennon of Hilo, Hawaii; a daughter, Abigail Grush of Portland, Oregon; a daughter, Emily Federighi of Elmhurst, Illinois; her husband, Byron Grush; two grandchildren; and two step-grandchildren. 

She was creative and loved to travel with groups of other artists for workshops in Italy, Spain, and Mexico. In her later years she painted, constructed art dolls, and made a series of daily art journals, which she shared on social media. 

She will always remain in our hearts.

A memorial will be held this spring, time and place to be announced. Please do not send flowers. If you wish to contribute to a charity in Martha’s name, we have chosen Arts for All Wisconsin (https://www.artsforallwi.org/support).