Robert G. Lowe

Robert G. Lowe of Needham died on June 5, 2011 at the age of 82. Much missed and beloved husband of Suzon E. (Swanson) Lowe, he is also survived by his brother John Lowe of Joliet, Illinois, son Christopher Lowe, Jacqueline Dirks and granddaughter Kay Lowe of Portland, Oregon; son Peter Lowe, Georgia Papageorgiou Lowe and grandchildren Olivia, Isabel and Davis Lowe of Georgetown, Massachusetts; and son Jonathan Lowe, Lauren Heberle, and grandsons Joey and Jamie Heberle of Louisville, Kentucky.
Bob was born on March 28, 1929 in Berwyn, Illinois, and raised in Riverside, a suburb of Chicago. After earning a baccalaureate degree at the University of Chicago, where he met Suzie, Bob attended the Art Institute of Chicago, married, then served as an army cryptographer in Georgia and Germany in the mid-1950s. Subsequently he worked for an design studio and did freelance design work in Chicago before moving with his young family to Needham in 1961 for a job as a children's book designer at Little, Brown & Co. in Boston. There he worked for 34 years, eventually becoming art director and design and production editor for children's books. He loved making books of elegant design supporting lively stories and attractive illustrations that drew children to reading and stimulated the imagination.
A gentle and thoughtful man with a complex and subtle sense of humor, Bob's values centered on finding the joys afforded by life, on appreciating, creating and sharing beauty, and on seeking broad fairness in society. Music and art were central for Bob. Classical music and opera were always on when he was home. He sang in choirs at Christ Episcopal Church in Needham and at the Swedenborgian Church in Cambridge, and studied and played classical guitar and recorder. Bob appreciated painting, sculpture, architecture, photography and performing arts. He made his own art, and encouraged his children and their friends to develop their creativity with projects involving them, in a wide range of artistic and craft media, including film, painting, wood carving, paper making, print making, macramé, stone carving, and photography.
Bob also was an active local participant in the great Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, working with the Episcopal Society for Cultural and Racial Unity, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Needham Fair Housing Committee. In August 1963 he traveled to the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, hearing Martin Luther King, Jr's most famous speech in person. For a period Bob and his family attended St. Ann's Episcopal Church in an African-American neighborhood in Dorchester, helping to create a day care center, working on neighborhood projects, and chaperoning beach and camping trips for community kids and his own.
When their children were in school, Bob supported his wife Suzie in returning to graduate school to get her Ph.D. and become a professional psychologist. Although he often had to bring work home with him, he always made time to be involved with his sons, from biking, playing tennis, canoeing and camping with Boy Scout Troop 13, to outings to the city or country, to artistic and craft projects, including a memorable Super-8 movie starring all the neighborhood kids. Later he and Suzie opened their home to three international exchange students, Johann Leibreich from France, Johan Storm Munch from Norway, and Barbara Ballauri from Italy.
Bob Lowe brought love to everything he did, large and small. His family remember with love and pride how he always tried to make the world a better, fairer, more joyful and more beautiful place, in his own modest way.
Donations in Bob's memory may be sent to Doctors Without Borders or the Union of Concerned Scientists. A memorial gathering to celebrate his life will be held in at First Parish Unitarian Church in Needham, 23 Dedham Avenue, at 2:30 p.m. Sunday September 18, 2011.

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