Marilyn Louise Riley Hodge, beloved mother of six, grandmother of four, sister, cousin and friend died on Saturday, Sept. 6. She was 76 years old.

Born in Manhattan on August 6, 1949 to Clarence and Eula Riley, Marilyn was a fearless, determined, charismatic, loving and accomplished woman. True to her spirit of doing things her way, she graduated from Immaculate Conception in Jamaica at just 16 and from Brooklyn College at 19.

After graduating college, she helped convert a 96-foot Baltic Grain Vessel into a luxury sailboat and embarked on a two-year journey across the Atlantic Ocean. After leaving Denmark, the crew encountered turbulent weather and had to be rescued by helicopter in the North Sea before eventually leaving from Spain to cross the Atlantic to the Caribbean before sailing up the Atlantic Coast to Martha’s Vineyard.

She went on to earn a master’s degree from New York University and began her career in education working at Medger Evers College in Brooklyn. She would meet her late husband Winston Hodge on a blind date at Victor’s Café in New York City. Marilyn and Winston were engaged within weeks and married within nine months. She defended her dissertation at Columbia University while pregnant with her first child and earned her Ed.D in clinical psychology.

After moving to St. Croix, she become the assistant administrator of mental health for the U.S. Virgin Islands before opening Tropical Expressions, a successful boutique interior design store serving residential, commercial and hospitality clients.

After her husband died in 1996, she returned to New York and a fulfilling career in higher education, retiring as the dean of students at Tidewater Community College in Virginia Beach.

Those who know Marilyn well know she was a force of nature. They will remember her inclination to share her perspective and advice (she couldn’t help it!), her tenacity, her willingness to spring into action to help those around her, her commitment to uplifting Black youth through her work mentoring young students at Howard University and her dedication to disadvantaged members of the community through her support of Samaritan House.

She found tremendous joy at the beach and in her garden on Martha’s Vineyard. Her yard was an immense source of pride — she could grow just about anything and was a perennial student of landscape design. She paid particular attention to the decades-old peonies her mother left behind, which Marilyn moved from New York to the Vineyard. They still bloom every June — Marilyn’s favorite month on the Island. If you were fortunate (or unfortunate) enough to pass Marilyn in her garden, before you knew it, you’d be moving a plant or digging a hole for a new shrub she’d picked up at Mahoney’s or Vineyard Gardens (“don’t forget to make a basin!”). Those fortunate souls were often rewarded with a cold drink (likely a martini) and good food (her legendary fried chicken if you were lucky), and an invitation to relax on the porch.

Marilyn is survived by her children, Adam, Ashley and Eric, her stepdaughters Caryn, Kristen and Stephanie, her grandchildren Owen, Elliot, Sydney and Leo, her brother Keith, many cousins and countless friends.

In lieu of flowers, please make contributions to the Harbor Homes Martha’s Vineyard or the Martha’s Vineyard Museum.