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Auto accident claims life of local volunteer
Published October 29, 2008
SEGUIN — Those who know of the Red Hat Society know it’s all about women who, while no longer exactly young, love life, know how to have a good time and don’t care who knows it.
They wear their red hats proudly, and that’s kind of how it was for Margaret Thompson, a retired Royal Navy nurse who met an American Naval officer named Ron, married him and moved to Seguin.
Monday, Thompson, 68, succumbed at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio to injuries she sustained in a Friday traffic collision on State Highway 123 South.
Seguin Police Detective Lt. Johnny San Miguel said Thompson was flown to BAMC in the wake of a three-vehicle accident at Meadow Lake Drive that occurred just before 6 p.m. Friday.
San Miguel said Thompson pulled up on westbound Meadow Lake Drive at Texas 123 and drove out into the intersection in front of a southbound Ford, which struck her 2006 Mazda, spinning it into a GMC pickup that was also in the intersection.
Thompson came to Seguin in the early 1990s with her husband, Ron, and made quite an impression among those who met her — whether they knew her well or not.
“I was not a personal friend, but I had a great deal of respect for her because she was really involved in all kinds of charitable work,” said Mayor Betty Ann Matthies. “Because she was involved in so many volunteer groups in the community and was so enthusiastic about her volunteerism and how hard she worked, she was definitely an asset to the community and it is a sad loss. She’ll certainly be missed, and my condolences go out to her husband and her family.”
Main Street Director Mary Jo Filip said what you remember about Thompson was her personality.
“She just really had a lot of fun and had a lot of color,” Filip said. “She was one of the people who really would totally get into ‘Hats Off to Juan Seguin.’”
Thompson had an uncommon creative spark that made even mundane things fun and showed her joy in embracing life, Filip said. She was a volunteer and really enjoyed downtown events and activities.
“She’s a very unique person, and she left a true impression and stood out in a very positive way,” Filip said.
Thompson had a flair for going all out, too, when it came to celebrating the community and its namesake.
“She would have the hat, the dress, the shoes and with great pride, she’d tell you she’d got it all at the Silver Center thrift shop or at the Cranny and put it all together with her own creativity,” Filip said.
Vicki Greer has trouble thinking about Seguin without Thompson because the pair met when Greer first came here in the early part of this decade — and because Thompson got Greer involved in her new community.
“If I hadn’t met her at Wal-Mart, there wasn’t one person I knew in Seguin,” Greer said. “She got me into the Red Hats and she got me into TOPS.”
And she never stopped working — although Thompson didn’t make any of her community involvement appear as though it were anything other than a pure joy, Greer said.
“She was just a very, vivacious, ‘go, go, go’ kind of a person,” Greer said. “She was into all kinds of things, and was real creative and a very good-hearted person. I don’t know how some of those organizations she was so active in will get along without her.”
Thompson was also proud of the Red Hat Society and what it did — or rather doesn’t do — as the group prides itself on being about fun and not about rules.
“One lady told me, ‘When Margaret gets to heaven, she’s going to get all those angels organized.’ I said, ‘She’ll have them all wearing red hats.’”
Maybe she would, but she had trouble getting Society members to wear their hats at funerals.
“She always used to say, when someone we knew died, that we’d have to wear our red hats to their funeral, but no one was ever quite sure about it and we never did,” Greer said.
On Thursday morning at 10 a.m. at Thompson’s memorial service, that will change, Greer said.
“We know where she is, she’s at peace with the Lord,” Greer said. “By Thursday, all the angels will have their red hats on, and so will we — we’ll be there with our red hats on.”
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