By James R. Hagerty

My mom, Marilyn Hagerty, was famous as a newspaper columnist only in and around Grand Forks, N.D., in early March 2012 when she dashed off a quick story describing the new Olive Garden restaurant there.

Out of the thousands of stories she wrote over more than 80 years, that was the one that made her internationally famous.

As was her custom, she didn't write a critique but simply described her experience. She reported that the "chicken Alfredo ($10.95) was warm and comforting on a cold day" and that portions were generous.

Internet wits discovered this story and began mocking Mom for writing an earnest review of a chain restaurant shunned by food snobs. Within hours, newspaper reporters in Minneapolis, New York and, yes, even Fargo began calling to ask what she made of all the snarky commentary.

Mom explained that she didn't have time to scroll through social-media comments. "I'm working on my Sunday column and I'm going to play bridge this afternoon," she told one reporter, "so I don't have time to read all this crap."

That is when Mom went viral. This feisty response from a supposedly defenseless grandmother endeared her to people around the world. She soon was flying to New York to appear on national TV programs including "Today," Anderson Cooper's talk show and "Top Chef," with Padma Lakshmi. Too busy with interview commitments in New York, she had to decline an invitation to appear on "The Tonight Show."

She enjoyed her shot of fame, and was sometimes bewildered by it. When she first lit up the internet, I emailed her: "You've gone viral!" She replied: "Could you tell me what viral means?" I wrote a front-page article about her for The Wall Street Journal.

Easy to please

Way back in 2012, the internet wasn't yet the angry, shrieking wasteland it has become. A simple story about a no-nonsense lady in North Dakota could break through the noise.

One irony is that she was never a restaurant critic. She wasn't even picky about food. "Some people like to complain about food," she said in a television interview shortly after the Olive Garden story appeared. "It's got to be pretty bad if I don't like it."

Writing about restaurants was only about a fifth of her job at the Grand Forks Herald. Mostly she wrote stories about people she met. More typical of her work was a 1974 profile of a bachelor farmer, Magnus Skytland, who lived without electricity, read by the light of a kerosene lamp and, late at night, serenaded himself on his violin. He had owned three horses named Sally, after a former girlfriend.

Inspired by her girlhood hero, columnist Ernie Pyle, Mom found stories everywhere she went, including the bowling alley. "When the five Miller sisters of Grand Forks and East Grand Forks get together each Thursday night, the pins really fly," she reported in 1957. She drove out to the small towns and farms to interview mayors, waitresses and farm wives. If there was a good bakery, she knew about it. People who were named "cheerful person of the week" in her column considered it a high honor.

I was holding Mom's hand when she died Sept. 16 of complications from a stroke. Two of her grandchildren had slept overnight in the hospital to make sure she wasn't alone. She was 99 years old and, until her stroke five days earlier, could walk without crutches or a walker. She had all her original equipment, including joints and teeth.

If she were writing this obituary, it would be much shorter. At age 82, three years before she went viral, Mom typed a few notes for anyone who might write her obit. At the end, she wrote: "This is more than anyone would want to know. Any obituary should leave out the frills underlined in color." Those frills included her 22 Associated Press state writing awards.

When she was viral, Anthony Bourdain, a New York food writer and television personality, arranged to meet her and persuaded HarperCollins to publish a collection of her restaurant reviews, "Grand Forks: A History of American Dining in 100 Reviews."

In her column, she once joked that she would like to have something named after her -- nothing grand like a building or bridge but perhaps something more modest, such as a sewage-pumping station. In 2002, Grand Forks officially dedicated the Marilyn Hagerty sewage station, bearing a plaque honoring her, on Belmont Road. People left flowers there the day she died.

The smartest man

Marilyn Gail Hansen was born May 30, 1926, in Pierre, S.D. Her father, Mads Hansen, who was born in Denmark, worked as a shipping clerk at a wholesale grocery company. Her mother, Thyra (Linnet) Hansen, was the daughter of Danish immigrants.

Though there were few books in the family home -- a Bible and a few Zane Grey westerns -- Mads Hansen made clear his admiration for educated people and told Marilyn that Bob Hipple, the editor of the Pierre Capital Journal, was the smartest man in town.

Her first job in journalism was as an assistant to the editor of an advertising sheet called the Pierre Daily Reminder. When there were blank spaces on the pages, Marilyn wrote short items to fill them and signed them as Reminder Rat.

In 1944, she enrolled at the University of South Dakota, where she rose to editor of the student newspaper, the Volante. She hired Al Neuharth as a sportswriter. He later became chief executive of Gannett and founder of USA Today.

In 1947, when she had a summer job at the Capital Journal in Pierre, she met Jack Hagerty, who worked for the United Press news service. They married in 1949. Jack, my dad, eventually became editor of the Grand Forks Herald. He died in 1997. Mom's survivors include me, my sister Gail Hagerty and eight grandchildren. Her other daughter, Carol Hagerty Werner, died in 2011.

After graduating in 1948, she worked for the American News in Aberdeen, S.D. Editors there wanted her to write for the society section, covering weddings, women's clubs and the like. "I told them I didn't go to college to work in the society department," she said. So she was assigned to write feature stories as well as covering the hospital and school board.

One evening in 1949, after a rainstorm, she slipped while trying to cross a street and fell into a trench swirling with muddy water. She managed to pull herself out of the trench, but her new raincoat was soaked and smeared with clay.

She couldn't let the incident go to waste. The next day's American News featured an account of her fall. She concluded her story with a description of her return to the street where she slipped:

A trip back to the scene of the swim somewhat soothed my damaged pride.

The ditch was actually almost 10 feet wide and 8 feet deep in the center.

Workmen erecting a boardwalk and fences explained to me that "some girl came along here and fell in last night."

"Yes," I said, "I know."

Write to James R. Hagerty at reports@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 19, 2025 09:48 ET (13:48 GMT)

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