Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Obituary

Former legislator Margo Fischer, 58, dies

The wife of former St. Petersburg mayor David J. Fischer was elected to the Florida House in 1996.

By CRAIG BASSE
Published October 8, 2005

ST. PETERSBURG - Margo Fischer, a former state legislator and wife of a longtime St. Petersburg mayor, died Friday at age 58.

Mrs. Fischer died at the Palms of Pasadena Hospice Unit, where she had been a patient for about three weeks.

Mrs. Fischer, whose husband, David J. Fischer, served as mayor longer than anyone in the city's history, had her own political career.

A Democrat who worked in the 1960 presidential campaign of John F. Kennedy, she won a seat in the state House of Representatives in 1996, defeating Republican Frank Farkas by about 1,700 votes.

Two years later, Farkas came back to oust her from the District 52 seat, which includes most of northeast St. Petersburg and Kenneth City.

When she tried to reclaim the seat in 2000, she again lost to Farkas, a St. Petersburg chiropractor.

Her campaigns emphasized putting more money into classrooms and making schools safer. She also expressed interest in helping the elderly through support of long-term care and making Florida more friendly toward business.

Mrs. Fischer, whose first taste of politics came as a volunteer in the Kennedy campaign, went on to manage the mayoral campaigns for her husband in 1991 and 1993.

In her bids for public office, she told voters a rags-to-riches story. She said her early years were spent in public housing in Youngstown, Ohio, where she was born, and moved to St. Petersburg with her mother when she was 10.

She grew up in St. Petersburg, attending Woodlawn, Lakeview and St. Jude elementary schools and graduating from St. Paul's Catholic High School in 1964. She studied at St. Petersburg Junior College and earned a bachelor of arts degree from Eckerd College in 1984.

One of her first jobs was as a flight attendant for Eastern Airlines. She then turned to the financial world, working for several years for Liberty National Bank and Reynolds Securities.

She was a secretary for Fischer, Johnson, Allen & Burke, a municipal bond company where David Fischer was a partner. She later was a vice president and corporate secretary-treasurer for Fischer, Johnson Inc. and Fischer, Johnson, Allen & Burke Inc.

She also worked for Reynolds Securities (later Dean Witter Reynolds) in St. Petersburg and SunTrust Securities in Tampa.

She was a former member and officer of the League of Women Voters. She also was a member of the American Heart Association, which named her Outstanding Volunteer of the Year in 2000. She also belonged to the YWCA of Tampa Bay, which bestowed on her in 1999 the Humanitarian Award from the Institute for Social Justice.

She was a member of the St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce, the Pinellas County Education Foundation, Gulf Coast Museum of Art, Suncoast Tiger Bay Club, Rotary Club and Florida Orchestra Guild.

The Chamber of Commerce's Women Council named her Distinguished Woman of the Year in 2000.

Eckerd College bestowed its Suzanne Armacost Medal for Excellence in the Community on her in 1999.

She belonged to the Florida Center for Children and Youth, U.S. Power Squadron, Florida Women's Sailing Association, Salty Sisters, Suncoast Tiger Bay Club, Florida Orchestra Guild, St. Petersburg Museum of History, Greater Pinellas Democratic Club and Pinellas County Democratic Executive Committee.

Survivors include her husband of nearly 19 years; two daughters, Allison M. Cook and Susan F. McGarry; and two sons, David J. Jr., and James B.

Funeral arrangements, to be handled by Anderson-McQueen Funeral Homes in St. Petersburg, were incomplete on Friday night.

[Last modified October 10, 2005, 09:58:26]