Marian F. Peterson (1926-2013)

In honor of Women’s History Month, learn about musician and professor of music Marian F. Peterson and her partner, Pat.

Marian Peterson

Marian was born in Salt Lake City, daughter of LDS apostle Mark E. Petersen and Emma McDonald. She learned to play the trumpet in her childhood and in her teens played trumpet solos at many LDS functions. She also played in the all-women’s jazz orchestra, The Swingettes.

Mickey Paramore and the Swingettes, 1940

Marian obtained her master's degree and PhD in music and music therapy from the University of Utah. She then became a professor at the Conservatory of Music, University of Missouri Kansas City.

Marian likely met her lifelong companion, Patricia V. (who is still living) at the University of Utah when they were both students there. Pat became a schoolteacher. When Pat was only six years old, she won a contest at the Ensign School here in Salt Lake, for her composition on "The Ideal Girl." As winner, she became the model as "the Ideal Girl" for the statute near the flagpole outside the Salt Lake City-County Building. She and a young boy are holding a copy of the Constitution.

Pat V. as the “Ideal Girl”

Around 1964 Marian became estranged from her prominent family over her Lesbianism while she was still at the U of U.

After moving to Missouri, Marian was also very involved in local politics, and in 1975 won a seat on the Lake Lotawana, Missouri city council. She was greatly loved by her music students, and they fondly remember the terrible puns she used in class. As Marian's obituary reports, "Her major interests were music, tennis, and dog obedience trials with her Standard Poodles. She organized and sang with barbershop groups, canoed several lakes in Canada, was an excellent sailor and enjoyed traveling. She was a champion of senior citizens and while still in school [at the U of U] ran a food program for them in Salt Lake City, as well as providing entertainment."

While there was some animosity between Marian and her apostle father, her partner Pat eventually endeared herself to Mark through humor. When apostle Petersen visited them in Kansas City, Pat would teasingly ask him how he took his coffee or what cocktail he would like. It’s very difficult understanding how Mark Petersen could write such hate-filled articles and speeches about Gays and Lesbians in the 1970s while having a Lesbian daughter.

Marian finally retired as a full professor in 1992. She and Pat owned homes in both Missouri and Sedona, Arizona, and Marion passed away while wintering in Sedona in 2013. Her obituary refers to Pat V. only as "her closest friend."

Many thanks to Jared Oaks for sharing his own research on Marian Petersen and her partner, Pat.