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Born in 1931 in Tulsa, OK to Maxine Elizabeth Boesche and John Morris McCorkle, Karen grew up in Pasadena, CA, graduating from South Pasadena High—where she also served as Senior Class President—in 1950.
Karen was a smart, brave, independent, and liberated young woman of the ‘50s. After attending Colorado College, she moved alone to New York City into a tiny walk-up apartment in the heart of bohemian Greenwich Village. She embarked on a career in the fashion industry, primarily in fashion textiles, which occupied her for the next 25 years.
In 1964, Karen and her former husband Bob Consolini, were co-founders with 4 other couples of a Montessori school on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, St Michael’s Montessori, which both their children attended. Originally occupying the basement of a church, it continues to this day as a much larger, expanded institution. This was one of Karen’s proudest life achievements.
A passionate and talented lifelong cook, Karen moved away from fashion in the early ’80s and started cooking professionally. For many years she was the personal chef to Pare Lorentz, the first documentary filmmaker in America, and his wife Elizabeth. Lorentz’s groundbreaking films were “The Plow the Broke the Plain” and “The River.”
Karen was a ham, loved an audience, and could have had a successful career on the stage. At her 80th birthday party she stood and told a very long, involved joke, the brilliant delivery of which her friends remember to this day. A family friend says “…she had a memorable and piquant personality.” He got that right. Karen was curious, warm, engaging, and an animated conversationalist.
Karen is survived by her children, Marella and Marcus, son-in-law James Rodewald, daughter-in-law Meg and grand-daughter Mirella (Mimi) Consolini.
Services will be private. In lieu of flowers, a gift in her honor may be made to Palisades Presbyterian Church.
Full obituary is at Parsell Funeral Homes.
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