THE SAME YEAR...

Michele always had a way with the animals. Island Sheba responded to every flick of the reins and shift in the saddle. Together, they won several competitions put on by the California Professional Horsemen Association.

“She loved it,” said Fred. “It wasn’t just the training of the horses. It was washing and cleaning the horses, polishing the silver and ironing competition clothes. She was on it. No one ever had to tell her to tend to a task. It’s a lot of work, and she was diligent about it.”

Michele was a good student who embraced the opportunities she had at Garces Memorial High School, Kern County’s premier Catholic high school. Sprinkled in between her jobs and horse training, she was a cheerleader and played softball. Michele and Cozette were two of the famous Acosta cousins – a lineup of young women who dominated the local softball diamonds for a solid generation in the 1960s and 1970s. Known as somewhat of a power hitter, Michele incited fear in her competitors and garnered encouragement from her mother – the coach of the team who doubled as a bookkeeper to Hollywood stars.

Michele left Bakersfield to pursue a college degree. In order to pay tuition, she sold her horse, Island Sheba. She attended college at California State University, Fresno, about two hours up CA-99, before transferring to San Francisco University and graduating in 1979.

In between classes, she worked in a furniture store and developed a love for the industry. With her design degree in hand, she took a job with W. & J. Sloane – a storied company that specialized in luxury furniture. Sloane furniture outfitted the Breakers, the White House and other homes of prominent families, including the Rockefellers, Whitneys and Vanderbilts.

At Sloane, Michele was an upholstery buyer who split her time between the store on Sutter Street, near Union Square in San Francisco, and the Fifth Avenue location in New York City. Across the hall from her office was another young professional named Peter Cassidy. They immediately struck up a friendship that lasted more than four decades.

When Sloane’s San Francisco office closed, Michele relocated to the New York office full time. In the early 1980s, Sloane filed for bankruptcy, and Michele moved to a company called Abraham & Straus. It was a major New York City department store headquartered across the East River in Brooklyn. Eventually, it merged with Macy’s.

At Abraham & Straus, Michele climbed the ranks and was named a buyer. She was young – only in her 20s – and a woman in a male-dominated industry who knew her business and her clients better than most.

One day, Bob McCreary walked through the doors of Abraham & Straus on a mission to salvage a relationship. He had recently been hired as the CEO of a struggling furniture company that had made unfulfilled promises to Michele. Bob went to Brooklyn, in part, to find Michele and offer a mea culpa on behalf of his new company.

“I caught the brunt of her toughness during my first visit with her,” said Bob.

After hearing Michele express justifiable disappointment, Bob made his own commitment to her. Then, he honored it. That started a relationship built on respect.

“If you made a commitment to her, you were going to keep it,” said Bob. “Commitments were important to Michele, and she didn’t forget.”

Over the next several months, business continued between Bob and Michele’s companies, and they developed a great working partnership. Neither of them knew that on August 31, 1985, after being friends and colleagues for years, the two would marry and start their own furniture company, which would change the course of their lives.

"SHE WAS SMART, SHE WAS PRETTY, SHE WAS FAIR, BUT SHE WAS TOUGH,"

remembers Bob.

“She knew how to speak her piece and she did! She was a kind person, but at the same time, one of strong will and opinions. I loved that about her, and that attracted me to her. And she had the most beautiful blue eyes I’d ever seen.”

“She put people at ease,” said Vettraino. “It was evident when she walked through one of their facilities – people would look up and smile. She was the business owner, but she was willing to jump in and do whatever, and she was willing to step back and let people own something. Knowing the balance of when to be involved and when not to is a gift.”

And she recognized something that many others who knew Michele understood. “She made you feel like you were the most important person in the room,” said Vettraino. “The eye contact. The genuine smile. She was a beautiful soul, and it came out in everything she said and did. She was a humble leader. She never talked about herself; she was always celebrating everyone else. That’s what made her unique. Her outward appeal was lifting up others.”

Having spent the early years of her career in retail, Michele often joined brand partners in training customer service representatives and product specialists on new pieces. “She was such a dynamic speaker and passionate about the brand,” said Vettraino. “What went beyond that is how she talked about her team. She would tear up every single time talking about the people that helped build the business.”

And that’s because those at McCreary Modern were family. Bob watched his father spend his days working in a furniture factory; Michele worked in her family’s cardboard plant. They had walked in the shoes of their employees and knew what it was like from their perspective. So they led with a single question: How do we take care of our people the best way we can?

“We want people to have a great career, to be healthy, to be able to retire and enjoy life,” said Coffey.

Early on, McCreary Modern added nurse practitioners to the staff, opened a clinic, started an on-site pharmacy and offered free mammograms for their employees. Then, McCreary Modern made sure all employees received a 401(k) plan in which the company gives 25 cents on every dollar with no limit on the match. In 2008, Michele and Bob gave 30% ownership of the company to their employees. As a result, they were not just working for McCreary Modern; these employees were owners, working for themselves.

Over the years, Michele immersed herself in all aspects of the theatre’s work. She stuffed envelopes with season tickets, worked the box office on show nights and served on the board of directors. She particularly enjoyed taking part on the programming committee and the play selection committee. She offered extra fabric from McCreary Modern for costumes or special shows, like Shakespeare in the Park. When the theatre’s seats were showing some wear and needed to be replaced, Michele wrangled a few of her experts at the company to help repair about 300 seats, saving the theatre enormous expense.

For years, McCreary Modern always sponsored the theatre’s holiday show. After the pandemic, Michele helped kick off a gala to reunite the community (“Everyone wants to have fun and laugh and talk and eat and celebrate,” she told them.). The theme of the gala was “Back to the Future.” Leave it to Michele to get the DeLorean parked out front for the evening.

About the only thing she didn’t do at the theatre was grace the stage. She wasn’t keen on the spotlight; she preferred being behind the scenes. Except for one time.

The Green Room Community Theatre has a program called “Limitless Theatre,” which invites teens and adults with special needs to learn basic drama techniques and explore different elements of the theatre. During one of their sessions, the participants chose to read and enact the story, “No, No, Miss Kitty Kat!” – a book written by Michele and illustrated by Brown. Because of COVID, the class was moved online, and practices were held via Zoom. Even still, the thespians wrote and learned a song with choreography to go with the story. When it was safe to gather, those in the class went to the theatre where Michele joined them on stage. She read the book to them, and they asked her questions about it.

“You could tell they loved it,” recalled Beech. “And you could tell she loved it. It was priceless.”

When Beech learned of Michele’s passing, she put off the task of filling the empty board seat. Eventually, she called Bob to ask for recommendations. He thought about it, and this man who avoids serving on boards and attending meetings, came to his conclusion. He called Beech.

Ayla Acosta (’17, MBA ’22) grew up 15 minutes from her aunt Michele and is grateful for the memories they shared – from their annual family trips to Sunset Beach to handwritten notes to their shared love of corgis to the time Michele soothed a bee sting with tobacco. For Ayla, her aunt was fully present.

“We talk about how much Michele did and how deep her relationships with people were,” said Ayla, “and that is because she was present. She was connected. She would talk to you and want to know the details of your life. She wanted to do things with you and spend quality time together. She just wanted to make sure that people felt loved and seen.”

Each summer, the family spent a week together at Sunset Beach. Many days, Michele would get up early and set up the beach chairs with her brother, Fred. She and her sister, Cozette, would get pedicures together. More than anything, it was a time each year to be together as a family.

In recent years, there was a group of six women from vastly different backgrounds who became the closest of friends. Nicknamed “The Six Pack” by Bob, their ages spanned roughly 18 years. There was a business owner, a sales consultant, a librarian, a nurse, a school counselor and adjunct professor, and an international sales manager. They were so different, yet bonded because they accepted each other for who they were as individuals. They dined together with spouses and significant others; celebrated birthdays; traveled together; attended Wake Forest sporting events; and laughed until they cried.

“Michele was the kind, wise, levelheaded leader of the group,” said Linda Corcoran. “She was always sharing sensible advice and always on point – whether we liked it or not. She wanted everyone to succeed and reminded you of how proud she was of you.”

As they remembered her – laughing and crying simultaneously – they cited her adventurous spirit and wicked candor.

“If she thought you were handling a situation wrong, she would tell you her thoughts and let you know her opinion – even if it wasn’t what you wanted to hear,” said Jill Griffin.