Margaret Causby
1950–2009
Memories of the Steel Magnolia of Compliance
By Stu Lehr and Mike Maher
Elegantly strong, approachably sophisticated, wryly funny, a compliance icon, and
the most loyal, heartfelt, steadfast friend
you could ever hope to meet. We both considered it a delightful privilege to be close
professional and personal friends with Margaret. It is a great sadness and loss to us and
to the compliance community to have lost
her on Tuesday, September 15, 2009, following her long and courageous battle with
cancer. She is survived by her wonderful and
devoted husband Paul, and by all of us who knew and
loved her as well. She was 58 years old.
Margaret lived her entire life near her childhood
home of Hampton, Virginia. At the age of 18, fresh
from high school, Margaret began her banking career in October 1969, as a bookkeeper, teller and note
department clerk at Old Point National Bank. Forty
years later, Margaret had advanced by dint of intelligence fueled by continued education, professional
achievement augmented by industry involvement,
and outstanding performance thanks to plain hard
work to end her career as executive vice president
of risk management, for that same grateful company,
Old Point National.
At the ABA National Regulatory Compliance Conference in June of 1997, I (Stu) had the honor of
presenting Margaret with the ABA’s Distinguished
Service Award. Margaret was only the third person
to have won the award, and it could not have been
more richly deserved. Margaret had been active with
ABA for a number of years, including the Compliance Executive Committee of which she also served
a term as chair, and made many contributions to the
ABA Bank Compliance magazine and other industry
efforts. But she loved her involvements with the ABA
Compliance Schools, where she served on the advisory board but also as a very popular instructor. She
shared her contact information freely when instructing and mentored and advised many students long
after their time at the schools.
We could go on and on about Margaret’s
accomplishments in her job and for the industry, but what meant most to us about
Margaret was who she was as a person.
We’ll always be grateful to the ABA for providing us the opportunity to meet Margaret.
For me (Mike) that was back in 1989 when
we were both on the Compliance Executive
Committee together. For me (Stu) it was
1993 when I joined the schools advisory
board—the one committee where the three
of us had the pleasure of serving at the same time.
Even once Margaret had finished her term on the
school board, the two of us started making annual
trips to see Margaret and Paul at their home in Williamsburg. For a number of years, after the conclusion
of the annual school board meeting in December,
we’d drive from D.C. down to Williamsburg and spend
the weekend. It always happened to be the “Grand
Illumination” weekend in Colonial Williamsburg, so
our memories include annual walks down “Duke of
Gloucester Street” looking at the Christmas decorations of that time period, warming by the fire and
taking pictures in front of the massive Christmas tree
in the lobby of the Williamsburg Inn, and a delightful
dinner at some great little tavern or restaurant that
Paul had discovered. And always, there was good
conversation and robust laughter, often to the point
of tears.
Compliance people are good people, and Margaret Causby epitomized that. She had the beauty and
tenderness of a Magnolia bloom, but if you were a
foolish commercial lender who didn’t think the regulations applied to you—you quickly learned the steely
resolve of a professional who never backed down
from what was right. She was a very special person
who always made you feel special. When you became
a friend of Margaret’s, there would never be another
birthday, anniversary, or other significant event where
you didn’t receive a card from her. Always. You could
count on it. Always … Margaret.
