OBITUARYMartha Ellen White-Warren of Ponte Vedra, Florida, passed into eternal life on March 31, 2021, after a long and courageous battle with cancer. The many whose lives she touched - family, friends, and loved ones - grieve her loss, as they celebrate the cherished memory of a life lived with passion, honesty, determination, and love.
Born on July 28, 1944, in Rockford, Illinois, Martha attended South Beloit High School, where she participated in band and choir, the Quill and Scroll Society, student government serving as class secretary, and graduated as a member of the school Honor Society in 1962. She married Nathaniel Martin of Rockford, Illinois, in January of 1962.
While working at Chrysler Corporation over the next decade, Martha returned to school to continue her studies at Rockford College, graduating in 1974 with a bachelor’s degree in psychology. Beginning a career in the field of human resources thereafter, she moved on to work with Procter and Gamble Corporation, where she remained for over thirty years. Through the course of the decades, her work took her through stints in New Orleans (whose music and cuisine remained life-long favorites), Des Moines, Albany, GA, Cincinnati, and Lebanon in Ohio, and then to Ponte Vedra.
She retired from her position as a human resources leader in 2016. As a beloved member of her P&G team, Martha was well-known and universally respected as an inspirational and effective lifelong advocate for workplace equity and diversity. A generation of P&G colleagues will remember Martha as an advocate, ally, dear friend, and sage career mentor who was always ready to listen, share and counsel. After retirement, she continued to do consulting work through her company The And Multiplier.
Martha’s passions were many, but her heart was happiest when traveling and when she was with family and friends. Her enthusiasm for seeing new places, trying new foods, experiencing different cultures, and making new friends took her around the world over the last decades of her life, sometimes in the interests of her company but more often, especially after retirement, enjoying fun and adventure in the company of her husband Joe Warren, whom she married in 1999 and whose steadfast love remained her constant source of strength to her death.
All those who knew her will never forget Martha’s vivacious personality or her dynamic energy. “The universe cooperates with a made-up mind,” she was fond of saying, and her unflagging determination to cooperate with the universe inspired her to always know her mind!
She is preceded in death by her mother, Marcia Morgan, her grandson, Xavier Murphy, her late husbands, Nathaniel Martin and Wallace White, and her sister-in-law, Gloria Teen Warren Blalock.
She is survived by her husband, Joe Warren; two children, Marcia (David) Murphy and Chad Martin; three stepchildren, Brian (Shy), Nicole, and Brandon (Romanda Warren; thirteen grandchildren, Madeline Murphy (Corey) Fitzpatrick, Julian (Elizabeth) Murphy, Gilbert, Isabel, Mathilda, and Eleanor Murphy, and McKenzie, Myles and Marley Martin, Bryson, Blaise, Rodney Ariel, and Sage Warren; and three great-grandchildren, Agnes, Bernadette, and Arthur Murphy; her brothers Earl (Karen) and Mark Drake, nephews Marcus and Dominique Drake, niece Renee Rademacher and several great-nieces and nephews.
In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to Martha’s grandson’s scholarship,
Xavier Thomas Murphy Spirit of the Mission Memorial Scholarship Fund.Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana610 Lingle Ave
Lafayette, IN 47901
ZOOM MEMORIAL SERVICE
Saturday, April 24th, 2021
11:00 a.m.
LINK TO SERVICE PASSCODE:754339
LINK TO PROGRAM