Roll Call Tribute

Margaret D. Watson 

February 7, 1948 - June 15, 2024 

Mary Margaret Watson, 76, of Houston passed away June 15, 2024. Born February 7, 1948, in Minneapolis, Minnesota to John Hartwell and Edna Dunn, she went by the name of Margaret all of her life. She is preceded in death by her parents and brother, Johnie. She is survived by her husband Michael Overbey of 18 years of marriage.

Margaret grew up in Oklahoma City and graduated from Harding High School in 1966. Following High School she attended Trinity University in San Antonio for one year when she transferred Oklahoma State University and graduated in 1970 with a degree in Psychology. At Oklahoma State she was a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma Sorority, serving as Vice-President her senior year.

Upon graduation from OSU she moved to Houston where she worked at TIRR counseling patients with spinal cord injuries. She began work on her Master’s Degree in Education guidance and Counseling.at UH. She completed the Masters in May of 1972. She later joined her major professor at UH in College Station to get a PhD in Industrial, Organizational Psychology from Texas A&M University completing that degree in December, 1993. Armed with her degrees she moved to Philadelphia to teach psychology and statistics at LaSalle University. She achieved tenure at LaSalle and was chair of her department while building a large group of friends and colleagues.

Attending the wedding of her best friend Susan Cook in 2002, she met the man she would marry, Michael Overbey. Leaving her tenure behind, she moved to Houston. She returned to UH to teach statistics until her retirement.

Margaret enjoyed flying. She earned her pilots license in high school and she and Michael shared a passion for flying, spending many hours in the air and around airports. Margaret was a small person physically and the funny story from her early flights was how she had to sit on a phone book when flying in high school.

Margaret and Michael both loved cats almost as much as flying. No conversation with either of them was complete without several anecdotes about their cat adventures.

A come and go visitation will be held on July 1st from 12:00pm-2:00pm. at Dettling Funeral Home 14094 Memorial Dr. Houston, TX 77079. In Lieu of flowers please consider a charitable donation to The Alzheimers Research Foundation www.alz.org