Funerals set for two people with long ties to local education

Funerals over the next few days will honor the memories of two people with long ties to education in St. Mary Parish.

A Mass of Christian Burial is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. Saturday for Margaret Lynn "Maggie" Melancon Bergeron at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Morgan City.

A memorial at 10 a.m. Monday at Ibert's Mortuary in Patterson will honor William Lee "Bill" Harris, followed by a noon funeral.

Bergeron, 86, died Wednesday at Ochsner St. Mary.

Bergeron's connection with Catholic education dates back to her graduation from the Sacred Heart Academy in 1953.

She served as librarian and choral director at Holy Cross Elementary.

Bergeron served as secretary of the Central Catholic Booster Club in 1980, and as founding secretary in forming the CCHS Alumni Association. She was co-director of that organization from 1988 until 2018.

Bergeron was inducted into the CCHS Hall of Fame.

Harris died Tuesday at age 70.

An Ohio native, he came to Louisiana to take a football coaching job at what was then the University of Southwestern Louisiana. He went on to become head coach at Patterson High 1983-86 before leaving to coach in Tennessee and Georgia.

He returned to Louisiana in 2007, again to work as a coach and teacher at Patterson High. He joined the faculty at Central Catholic in 2012 and remained there until he retired in 2015.

Full obituaries for Bergeron and Harris appear in the Obituaries section of this website.