Marion F. Kaisla, 73, accounts coordinator

Mementos around her house might have raised intriguing questions about where Marion Flood Kaisla worked.

There were the highball glasses with etchings of the StarKist advertising figure Charlie the Tuna.

There were bottles of several varieties of Tabasco sauce brought back from the brewing vats on Avery Island, La.

And strangely, bottles of experimental forms of Heinz ketchup, colored green and purple.

"I thought they were disgusting," Mrs. Kaisla's daughter, Katherine A. Dewechter, said about the ketchup, "but my kids loved them."

On Wednesday, Sept. 10, Mrs. Kaisla, 73, of Gloucester City, an accounts coordinator for a former warehouse firm there, died of lung cancer at home.

A 1959 graduate of Gloucester City High School, Mrs. Kaisla was secretary to a president of First Camden National Bank & Trust Co, from 1959 to 1964.

She resigned from full-time work to raise her children and, over the next few years, was president of the parent-teacher association at the Brown Street School in Gloucester City, where she was a Brownie leader and a Girl Scout cookie chairman, her daughter said.

But after three years, in 1967 she began her 38-year career with the John-Jeffrey Corp., a regional warehousing and distribution company in Gloucester City.

At first, she was a night secretary, working 5 to 9 p.m., but in 1978 she became one of five account coordinators for the firm.

Some companies with which she worked gave her presents, Dewechter said, such as "highball glasses with Charlie the Tuna etched on them."

But some went a step further.

The McIlhenny Co. took her to its Tabasco headquarters, Dewechter said, "so she could see the manufacturing process and the people she dealt with over the years."

General Mills took her to its Battle Creek, Mich., plant, and officials from the H.J. Heinz Co. escorted her around their Pittsburgh headquarters, rewarding her with the colored ketchup.

The John-Jeffrey firm contributed to the goodies.

When there was warehouse spillage of candies from firms that didn't want them returned, John-Jeffrey allowed its workers to take them home, she said.

"They were generous to a fault," she said, and as a result the Kaisla home was the place for kids to go on Halloween.

Gregg Teears, an office manager at John-Jeffrey until it closed in 2007, worked with Mrs. Kaisla until she retired in 2005.

"She was extremely dependable, would do anything for you," Teears said. "She was a good friend, in addition to being a good worker for a long time."

Besides her daughter, Mrs. Kaisla is survived by son William M., a sister, and three grandchildren. Her husband, William J., died in 1984.

A visitation was set from 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 20, at St. Mary's Church, 426 Monmouth St., Gloucester City, before an 11:30 a.m. Funeral Mass there, with private interment.

Donations may be sent to the American Cancer Society at www.cancer.org/donate.

Condolences may be offered to the family at www.mccannhealey.com.