Yuma says goodbye to native daughter

Many pages in the history of Yuma may be closed as their creator and “walking history” has died.

Mary Redondo Loroña passed away at her Yuma home Aug. 25 with family and friends at her bedside.

Loroña descended from a major pioneering family in Yuma and contributed much of her life to helping preseve this area's history.

“Mary was a driving force in maintaining old-time family histories in Yuma, especially of her own legacy,” said Carol Brooks, curator of the Yuma County Historical Society, a branch of the Arizona Historical Society (AHS).

Loroña was the great-granddaughter of Jose Maria Redondo, a native of Sonora, Mexico, who settled in what was Colorado City (now Yuma). Redondo has been heralded as the father of modern-day agriculture in the Yuma area.

Loroña was born in Yuma Aug. 22, 1914, to Delfina (Garcia) and Joseph S. Redondo. She married Joe Loroña, a Yuma fire chief, May 23, 1939. He died in 1977.

“Along with her cousin, Rosemarie Gwynn, who died in 2009, Mary helped create the Yuma branch of the AHS and began oral histories of longtime families in Yuma,” Brooks said. “Mary was active in conducting oral interviews with families, translating from Spanish into English and transcribing them for history. She did at least 100 families with these histories in our archives.”

She added that local historians have certainly lost a major resource.

“Throughout the years, Mary was the first one I would call to find out history of different families and events. If she didn't have what I needed, she would tell me who to contact. I will miss her very much,” Brooks said.

Lenore Stuart, Loroña's daughter, recalls her mother visiting schools in the area to encourage children to learn about the history of their families.

“History was her life,” Stuart said. “She would often take family and friends to the old Yuma Cemetery to find burial plots and follow her ‘Nana' Delores Figueroa, Jose Redondo's youngest daughter's ideas to treat history as a treasure.”

This history was passed on by Mary to one of her cousins, Bruce Gwynn.

“I once asked Mary how she remembered all the stories she had been told,” Gwynn said. “She said her aunt had told her the reason was because (Mary) had her head full of butterflies, so the stories had to be repeated so she would remember them.”

One of Loroña's favorite stories was one about a male ancestor who was known by the family as a “lost child.”

“When he was just a baby, his parents were coming from down in Mexico,” Gwynn said. “The baby was in a basket tied to a burro, but fell off. The parents didn't notice it for a time, then went back to the water tanks close to Wellton, found him and brought him to Yuma.”

Another favorite story involved Loroña's antique piano.

“It had been purchased by her great-grandfather from the Steinway Company in New York and made its way down the East Coast, South America, around Cape Horn, north on the Pacific side of South America and to the Sea of Cortez,” said Lorraine LeRoy Merkel. “From there it was taken by steamboat to the Yuma Crossing.”

Merkel spent many hours with Loroña and other family members compiling a publication called “Redondo: A Yuma Legacy,” which was funded by the Yuma Crossing National Heritage Area.

Loroña will also be remembered for several local business ventures.

Loroña and Rosemarie Gwynn pooled their money, took the train from Yuma to San Diego and bought flowers and greenery, which were transplanted for sale. That was the beginning of the Potting Shed business and later Clothing for Gentle Women.

The potting operation closed when grocery stores and other businesses opened their own plant places. The clothing store used to have fashion shows and luncheons, except on Mondays, because they took that day off to play cards. The store closed in the early 1990s.

Loroña was active with the Altar Society at Immaculate Conception Church and led productions of Las Posadas in downtown Yuma for several years.

Loroña's grandson Michael Turskey said: “I remember being recruited to help put all the paper-bag luminarias along the route of Las Posadas downtown. It was a fun time and had a lot of history lessons.”

Loroña also had early membership and support of the Yuma Fine Arts Association and assisted the late Howard Gwynn with the development of downtown Yuma in the early 1960s.

Loroña was preceded in death by her parents; husband, Joe Loroña; daughter, Margaret (Bill) Graham; sister, Eleanor Garcia; a granddaughter and two great-grandchildren.

Survivors include daughters Lenore (Jerry) Stuart of Yuma, and Irene (Joe) Turskey of San Diego; sister, Adeline Ayala of Yuma; 14 grandchildren, 48 great-grandchildren, 42 great-great-grandchildren, several nieces, nephews and cousins.

A rosary will be at 7 p.m. Friday and a Mass at 9 a.m. Saturday, both at the Immaculate Conception Church.

Burial will be at the Yuma City Cemetery. Johnson Mortuary is handling arrangements.