Margaret MacMillan Cool - Dole

Born on June 3, 1927 in Burnaby, British Columbia, Margaret often remarked that she had led three distinct and wonderful lives. The first was in the small Alaskan town of Ketchikan, where she grew up as the daughter of John Roderick MacMillan, a banker, and Ellen Rogers MacMillan, who worked at a local bookstore for many years.

Like her ancestors, who emigrated from Scotland to Canada and to Alaska at the time of the gold rush, Margaret had an adventurous spirit. From an early age, she swam in Ketchikan’s frigid waters, hiked its wild and forested terrain, and explored nearby islands—experiences that instilled a lifelong love of the natural world. As a young girl, she won local bicycle races and competed in archery, and as a teenager, she was a champion ice skater.

Margaret and her brothers, Ian and Donald, came from a family of storytellers. They would often gather around a bonfire on the beach in the evenings, singing and sharing stories. Margaret ventured south for college, first attending Washington State College and then the University of Washington. In 1948, in her junior year, Margaret became Miss Alaska, sharing her passion for her home at civic events a decade before Alaska became the 49th state.

Margaret's second life began with her marriage to Rodney Lee Cool, PhD, an experimental high-energy physicist who later contributed to the discovery of the quark. They met when Rodney traveled to Ketchikan from his hometown of Platte, South Dakota to help take care of the estate of a relative. Before their June, 1949 wedding in Ketchikan, Margaret, an accomplished seamstress, made her entire trousseau. After a honeymoon spent hiking trails in the Canadian Rockies, the couple moved to Sayville, NY, near Brookhaven National Laboratory, where Rodney was then employed.

In 1950, Rodney and Margaret set off for Georgetown, Colorado, a silver mining ghost town, where Brookhaven had built a mountaintop log cabin laboratory to study cosmic rays. During their stay in Georgetown, their first two children, Ellen and John, were born, with Rodney driving Margaret through snowstorms to the maternity ward of a Denver hospital.

After returning to New York and buying a house in Bellport, the couple welcomed two more children, Mary Lee and Adrienne. Over the next three decades, the family divided their time between Geneva, Switzerland, Ferney-Voltaire, France, and New York City while Rodney conducted research at CERN and Rockefeller University. During those years Margaret, who was a master of many home arts, became adept at French and Italian cooking and gathered friends and family for elegant dinner parties. She loved the outdoors, competed in tennis, and hiked and skied the Alps with Rodney and their children.

After Rodney’s death in 1988, Margaret’s third life began with her 1993 marriage to Vincent Dole, MD, a physician-scientist at Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research who co-developed the methadone treatment for heroin addiction. Both shared a love of nature, adventure, classical music and opera. Together, they had many happy times at their cabin in the woods, attended concerts and traveled the world, including Thailand, Israel, China, Denmark, and Sweden.

Margaret was interested in everyone's story and had a remarkable memory for detail. She had an extraordinary gift for connecting with others and loved to collect and share their stories and her own. Warm, engaging and always impeccably dressed, Margaret had friends around the world and will be deeply missed.

Margaret was predeceased by her beloved brothers Donald Angus MacMillan and Ian Roderick MacMillan. She is survived by daughter Ellen Cool Kwait and son-in-law Andrew Kwait, son John Post Cool and daughter-in-law Lisa Collier Cool, daughter Mary Lee Cool Gupta and son-in-law Paul Gupta, daughter Adrienne Margaret Cool and daughter-in-law Anne Simon, seven grandchildren and six great-grandchildren, and her longtime family friend and caregiver, Desmond Hall. A private funeral was held at the family burial plot in Marblehead, Massachusetts and will be followed by a celebration of Margaret’s life in the summer of 2022. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Audubon Society.