Mary Lu Fox, 68, owner of Fox Farm in Barrington Hills, where she raised Arabian horses, died Wednesday in her home there.
Mrs. Fox graduated from Mundelein College, Chicago, with a bachelor of science degree in biology in 1951. She and her late husband, Dr. Donald R. Fox, former chief of staff and director of laboratories at Alexian Brothers Medical Center, Elk Grove Village, were married that year.
She was a past treasurer of the Northern Illinois Arabian Horse Association and a member of the National Arabian Horse Association and the Barrington Hills Hunt Club.
Two of her Arabian horses were national show champions in the 1960s.
“When she and my father moved here (Barrington Hills) in the 1960s, she started with two horses and increased the number to 35,” said her daughter Nora Handler.
Her daughter said that Mrs. Fox, who first worked with horses when she was a teenager, actively showed them in competitions until the death of her husband in 1973, when she converted the farm to a boarding stable.
“She was a brilliant person,” her daughter said. “My husband, who is a physician, said that she knew more medicine than any other layperson he had met. She ran the business, did the finances, raised eight children, seven of them on her own after my father died, and three with special needs,” she said. “She was a phenomenally capable person.”
Other survivors include four other daughters, Margaret Fox-Hawthorne, Julia Prazak, Mary Fox-Geiman and Kathleen Polizzi; three sons, Martin J., Patrick V. and Michael T.; two sisters, Joanne Beegan and Donna Kapche; and nine grandchildren.
Mass will be said at 1 p.m. Saturday in St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church, 111 S. Hubbard St., Algonquin.
