Dorothy Cousins

Cousins is the youngest of the McWilliams children, born into a well-educated Pasadena family whose ancestors reportedly came west during the Gold Rush era. Cousins was born in Pasadena April 7, 1917. The sisters both attended Katharine Branson School in Ross. They were strikingly similar, tall in stature with athletic builds and the same distinctive voice. Neither was much interested in cooking in the early days. John, the middle brother, died in April 2002 after a lengthy career as a businessman in Williamstown, Mass. Dorothy and Ivan Cousins, an antiques dealer and musician, were married in New York in 1950. Eventually, the Cousins returned to the Bay Area and built a home in Sausalito when land in Marin County was cheap. They lived there for more than 45 years and raised two children, Phila (short for Philadelphia) - a psychologist - who lives with her family in Golden, Colo., and Sam, an architectural designer, who lives in Connecticut. Dorothy Cousins turned her attention to civic matters in Marin County, serving as president of the Tamalpais High School Parent-Teacher Association in the early 1970s, among other things. A theater major at Bennington College, Cousins was a founding member of the Marin Country Day School, and she served on the board for several years. She also volunteered her time at Sunny Hills Children's Garden in San Anselmo, a nonprofit organization that provides residential treatment for emotionally disturbed children. Ivan, who died in 1989, and Dorothy took up the cause of Children's Garden, and, in the aftermath of Proposition 13, organized an annual event called "The Culinary Carnival" to raise money, and it didn't take long to enlist the help of her famous sister to promote the event.