Helen (McGee) Grier

Helen B. (McGee) Grier, of Hazle Township, Beaver Brook, died Monday, September 2, 2024,
surrounded by her children, grandchildren, and beloved companion Belle. She took pleasure in the
home she lovingly remodeled and maintained for sixty years.

Born September 1944, at Saint Joseph’s Hospital, Hazleton, she was the daughter of the late John
“Jack” McGee and Mabel (Newton) McGee. Preceded in death by her first husband John C. Grier
(1970) at a very young age, Helen cherished her marriage of twenty-eight years with the late
William J. Grier (2021). She was also preceded in death by her sister Hannah Magarosky (2005)
and brother James McGee (2023).

Surviving are children: John (Shannon) Grier, Ft. Worth, Texas; Carolyn (James) McKinley,
McAdoo; Jane Grier, Tamaqua; Christine (Jonathan) Marsicano, Hatfield; grandchildren: Jessica
(Thomas) Bedford; Carrington Grier; James McKinley Jr.; Sophia, Mia, and Mary Marsicano;
great-granddaughter Eloise Bedford; grand-niece Melanie Ogunwale; sister Myrtle (Reid)
Hergenroeder; brother John McGee; brothers-in-law Tug Grier and Mac Grier; sisters-in-law Jo
Goetsch, Margaret (George) Harris, Ethel Gmitter, Donna Grier, Pat Grier, Cheryl Moyer, and Shel
Wood; along with many loved nieces and nephews.

A 1963 graduate of the Hazleton Senior High School, where she played basketball, Helen was a
renaissance woman who taught herself the skills needed to maintain a home for her children
including all phases of reconstructing rooms from bare studs to finished dry wall. During the 1970s,
she bowled in the Hazleton Bowling League. She worked in sewing factories throughout Hazleton
and McAdoo, cleaned McAdoo Catholic School, waitressed at Genetti’s Catering, was a cashier at
Gee Bee’s, worked the grill at McDonald’s, was a deli-person at McAdoo IGA, operated cigar
making machinery at Consolidated Cigar Corporation, and provided day-care for her grandson
James and later helped to raise her grandson Carrington.

A Catholic since birth and a member of All Saints Parish, McAdoo, Helen began each day by
praying the Rosary. During the pandemic and while battling cancer, she enjoyed seeing her friends
by watching the online Mass from Holy Rosary Parish and from the Parish of St. John XXIII,
Tamaqua.

A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at 11 am, Friday, September 6, 2024 at All Saints
Parish, 21 North Cleveland Street, McAdoo, PA, internment will follow at Saint Gabriel’s
Cemetery, 241 S Poplar Street, Hazleton, PA.

Friends and relatives may call Friday morning at the church prior to the mass from 10 AM to 11 AM

Memorial Contributions may be made to the Hazleton Animal Shelter, 101 N Poplar Street,
Hazleton, PA 18201 or All Saints Parish, 21 North Cleveland Street, McAdoo, PA 18237.

Funeral Arrangements under the direction of the Joseph B. Conahan Funeral Home, Inc. 532 N.
Vine St. Hazleton.

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