Maitland Cotton Stanley 

November 1927 - August 2009 Mat Stanley, 81, passed away 
peacefully at home on Sunday, August 9, after a long illness, 
with his wife Peggy and family at his bedside. A long-time 
resident of San Francisco, he most recently lived in Greenbrae. 
Retired in 1992 after a 35-year career with Swissair, San 
Francisco, as cargo specialist, Mat was also a respected 
researcher and historian of the mining community of Gold Hill, 
NV. A second edition of his book, "Slippery Gulch: A Guide to 
Gold Hill, Nevada," was published this spring. A native of Los 
Angeles, Mat was born into a family of artists. His mother, 
Kathleen Cotton, was an illustrator and his father, George 
Maitland Stanley, was the designer and sculptor of the Oscar 
statuette, the monumental Muse of Music sculpture and fountain at 
the entrance to the Hollywood Bowl, and other notable public 
works in Southern California. Toward the close of World War II, 
Mat enlisted in the Coast Guard and served on a cutter on the 
North Pacific - a brief furlough in Tientsin sparked a lifelong 
interest in travel. His first gift was for painting - he was the 
youngest person ever to be invited to join the California 
Watercolor Society. Mat graduated from the Chouinard Art 
Institute in 1950, then briefly pursued a career in commercial 
art in New York before going into the airline business. Mat and 
Peggy traveled extensively throughout Europe and Great Britain, 
as well as to Hong Kong, southern China, Singapore and Bangkok. 
He took up skiing in his forties to be able to follow Peggy to 
Sun Valley and Austria; he joyfully celebrated his 80th birthday 
with Peggy at the Nohl family's Hotel Montjola in St. Anton, 
where he and Peggy had skied and hiked for many years. Mat often 
said he was eternally grateful that he didn't have to take up 
tennis in his forties; a shoulder injury had sidelined Peggy from 
the courts. An astute observer of the natural world, Mat sketched 
and painted intermittently throughout his life. As an 
accomplished amateur paleontologist, he discovered in 1967, on a 
butte in Siskiyou County, a new genus and species of Silurian 
rugose coral named "Wintunastraea stanleyi." Mat will be 
remembered by his family, friends and colleagues for his great 
kindness, calm and sense of proportion - and for a sly sense of 
humor. He was a man who saw his own experience as part of a 
larger circle of life. When asked toward the end of his life by 
one of his sons how it felt to face what lay ahead, Mat said 
quietly, "It feels natural." His beloved wife and companion of 36 
years, the former Peggy Jensen, survives, as do three sons from 
his previous marriage: Vincent (Nora Gallagher), of Santa 
Barbara; Christopher (Cynthia Taylor), Bainbridge Island, Wash.; 
and Gregory (Susan), Vacaville; four grandchildren: Ariana 
Taylor-Stanley, Brandon Morgan, Vincent Stanley and Danielle 
Stanley; brother-in-law Bill Jensen; nephews Mark Jensen and Erik 
Jensen, niece Cynthia Jensen Moffa, and their spouses and 
children. The family is grateful to Marin Hospice by the Bay for 
the care Mat received during his final days. Per Mat's wishes, a 
family gathering in his remembrance and honor will be held at the 
Gold Hill Hotel at a future date. 

Published in San Francisco Chronicle on August 23, 2009