Ginny Brush was a vivacious girl of nearly sixteen in the summer of 1938, living on her family farm and grooming an Angus steer to show at the county fair. Earl Geiger was 19, and had just graduated from high school when Ginny caught his eye during a 4-H tour. Earl courted Ginny, taking her on picnics, despite her parents’ misgivings. As in a fairy tale, the two later eloped and lived happily married for nearly 79 years, rarely away from each other’s side, even in death.

The second of four children of James Basil and Mabel Kenner Brush, Ginny as a farm girl rode a pony named Black Beauty, and attended a one-room country school through eighth grade. Ginny and her family struggled throughout the Great Depression, losing the family farm. She remembers eating apples from the farm as her main source of food and wearing shoes long after they had become too small. Always striving to succeed, even as a youngster, Ginny competed in the county spelling bee and won a ribbon at the fair for her home baked bread. She always loved the heel of a freshly baked loaf the best. At age 12, she bravely left the farm to enter high school in Brooklyn, IA, where she stayed with a family she didn’t even know. 

Both Ginny and Earl wished to attend college, but neither could afford it. Earl took over his family’s farm, and Ginny finished secretarial school, returning to the Brush farm to help her parents. She and Earl dated three years, enjoying many of the same things, especially dancing. Then, despite differing religions and the wishes of their parents, they drove to Missouri and married, on July 31, 1941.

On their own farm now, with no plumbing, Ginny struggled to keep house, care for, feed and do laundry for her husband, and soon her new baby Gary along with two hired men. Sadly their second son died at birth. Always striving for a better life off the farm, Ginny encouraged Earl to take a job with Farmers Hybrid Hogs of Hampton, IA. The family moved with him to a fixer-upper house in town. 

While raising a growing family which now included daughter Mary Lynn, Ginny was long the force behind her husband’s business ventures.  Their endeavors included stints in Grinnell, IA, Aurora, NE, and Mount Pleasant, IA. In 1953 they made a move to Edina, MN for Earl to head Cargill’s seed-production division in Minneapolis where daughter Jane was born. Soon after, in 1956, business brought them to Little Falls, MN, for Earl’s partnership in Larson Boat Works, where son Tom was born, and finally a move back to Edina. Future business involvements included Oil-Dyne, a return to Larson Boat Works, C. A. Lund Company and Northland Skis of St. Paul to produce new lines of skis, along with Northland Hockey sticks, Rolite, Inc. and The Warren Company. Later, when Earl ventured into banking, eventually forming Heritage Bancshares Group, Inc., Ginny took computer classes and subsequently kept the records for the corporation.  

All the while Ginny gathered lifelong friends around her. Known for her fabulous entertaining expertise, Ginny hosted dinners, bridge and cocktail parties and long weekends at the lake house for their many close friends. Ginny was also a member of the Abbott Northwestern Hospital Auxiliary, volunteering for many years at the hospital. She was a member of The Woman’s Club of Minneapolis for more than 60 years. As a member of its program committee she helped select and entertain speakers for the Tuesday Auditorium.

She enjoyed playing bridge, taking a child psychology course offered by Iowa State on TV, joining a metro-area New Neighbors group, and volunteering to help children who were handicapped as well as inner-city children learning to read. In addition to boating and snow skiing, needlepoint and knitting. Ginny was a faithful member of the Catholic Church, and eventually both she and Earl became members of St. John the Evangelist in Hopkins, St. Thomas of the Pines at Gull Lake, Pax Christi in Eden Prairie and the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis. 

Ginny and Earl were world travelers across Europe and Asia. They retired near many friends on Longboat Key, FL, and in Scottsdale, AZ where they loved to play golf.  Ginny was an avid reader and a talented painter. She was known for her paintings of birds, especially her beloved chickadees, and countryside scenes. Her paintings often adorned the hallways of Friendship Village in Bloomington where Ginny and Earl spent their final years among their many lifelong friends.

Ginny was dedicated to her husband, Earl and their family, and she especially loved being together at their home built on Gull Lake. Just as he followed her in life, Earl followed Ginny in death, passing way just hours later.   

Ginny and Earl are survived by their four children: Gary (Nancy Egerstrom) Geiger, Mary Lynn VanDyke, Jane Ellen Salland (Andrea Falconieri) and Thomas William (Cindy Woodward) Geiger; 12 grandchildren: Christopher, Adam (Jennifer Galvelis), Luke (Allison Rice), Bill (Alison Daly), Jane (Chris) McGowan, Patrick (Blythe Sobol) Salland, Elizabeth (Jay) Urban , Kenneth (Yalin Chen) Geiger, Daniel (Phuong Nguyen) Geiger, Lynn (Aleja Ortiz) Geiger, Theodore, and Jacob Geiger; and 14 great-grandchildren: Maxwell and Celeste Geiger; Claire, William, and Charles VanDyke; and Caitlin and CJ Claggett, Jordan Robinson, Pearl Geiger, Owen and Crosby Geiger, Tobin Salland, Lillith Geiger and Maya Geiger.