Jacqueline Stegner

Jacqueline Rose Stegner (née Dinsmore) was born in Grand Forks, B.C. to Raymond Ernest and Rose Marie (née Borell) Dinsmore, but she grew up in Vancouver, B.C. Showing an early interest in music, she began private voice lessons at age six. In time, keyboard and music theory lessons were added using a Canadian study program from Trinity College of the Royal Academy of Music, London, England. She performed for testing by British adjudicators who traveled across Canada annually.

Performance opportunities included vocal competitions in the B.C. Music Festival and the Welsh Festival, outdoor community talent shows, church choirs, and, as a child soloist, for weddings and special events. At King Edward High School, singing in operetta productions and being in the choral music program added to her preparation to become a choral music teacher. Her participation in her high school MacMillan Music Club enabled her to be a student usher at the Orpheum Theatre, the Vancouver Civic Auditorium, and the Vancouver Repertory Theatre, giving her exposure to the professional performing arts.

From age 14, she worked Saturdays and school vacations for a women's ready-to-wear chain, a financial loan company, CBC Radio, and CBUT.

She entered UBC in 1954 to pursue a Bachelor of Arts degree. While there, she served on the Special Events Committee, bringing professional musicians and speakers to the campus. This committee was in charge of hosting the guests as well as preparing their publicity and public relations, and it gave her more backstage experience.

Her family moved to Seattle in 1957, where she completed her BA in Communications from UW ('58) and her teaching certification from Seattle University ('59). She joined the staff of Catherine Blaine Junior High School teaching the 7th – 9th grade Choral and General Music, as well as 9th grade English and 8th grade Speech/Drama. By attending UW summer classes and after-school In-Service Training, she received her MA in Communications from UW ('64). From 1969 to 1971, she spent one-half of her teaching time on the UW School of Music staff supervising graduate students seeking Master of Music degrees and their teaching certificates.

During this period, she served on boards of Delta Kappa Gamma (teaching honorary), the Seattle Photographic Society, the Photographic Society of America, and as an advisor to a 9th grade Girls Y-Teen group. After spending a summer as the Talent Show Coordinator and Front Desk Night Clerk at Paradise Inn, she managed the Rainier National Park Co. seasonal office in the Olympic Hotel in Seattle for several summers, sending bus tours around Mount Rainier.

In June 1972, she married John Jacob (Jack) Stegner. She ended her teaching career and devoted herself full-time to her new family in her Magnolia home. Three years later, they moved to a small acreage on Samish Island overlooking Padilla Bay, and her lifestyle changed completely. Jack now had enough land to return to his North Dakota roots, caring for sheep and raising lambs. But with crabbing and fishing nearby, boating became a bigger part of their lifestyle. Between summer boating to northern B.C. and Alaska, entertaining on Samish Island, and trips in their motor home to almost every state, they lived a busy lifestyle.

After Jack's sudden death in 1996, Jacquie returned to her fine arts interests, helping to develop programs at the Museum of Northwest Art in La Conner, starting with the Monday Afternoon Forum (Docent education) and Family Art Day (Intergenerational gallery visits and hands-on art activities). A trained Art Education Director was soon hired and the MoNA Link program was added. This program puts art education specialists into classrooms, brings classes to the museum for tours and hands-on art activities, and leaves a legacy of local teachers trained to integrate art projects into all of their lesson plans.

Eventually, as a MoNA board member, she became Chair of the Development Committee, using her publicity and fundraising skills to organize MoNA Style, Art & Architecture Tours and programs designed to keep the “fun” in “fundraising.”

At this time, the Skagit Symphony moved to McIntyre Hall, and she helped initiate the School Concerts program, which brings students from all seven county school districts—as well as from private, parochial, and home schools—to a live concert in late January. All transportation and performance costs are paid by symphony donors.

Jacquie was strongly committed to ensuring that the cultural values of fine arts and the need to preserve the environment were passed on to future generations, which led her to focus on developing endowment funds and legacy circles for the non-profit organizations in Skagit County.

She is survived by two stepsons, Harry Austin Stegner II of Mount Vernon, WA, and Robert Stegner of Bellingham, WA; two grandchildren, Linnea Stegner of Edmonds, WA, and Andre Stegner of Mount Vernon, WA; and several cousins.

Memorials may be made to your favorite charity or to endowments held by the Skagit Community Foundation:

McIntyre Hall Local Performing Arts Endowment
Padilla Bay Foundation Endowment Fund
Museum of NW Art Endowment
Skagit Symphony Endowment

Skagit Community Foundation 
P.O.Box 1763                                                                                                                                                                                            Mount Vernon, WA 98273