Your Neighbor: Mary Francis Carroll

Neighborhood: The Glenridge
Neighbor since: 2003

Mary Francis Carroll has seized opportunities throughout her life with the same confidence, independence and vigor she exudes today.

“I like my independence, I really do,” Carroll says.

The Chicago native graduated in 1943 from business school at Northwestern University and went into public accounting at Northern Trust Co., in Chicago.

“It was a perfectly lovely time for a woman to be a business major, because men were going off to war,” Carroll says. “They would never hire a woman before then.”

Carroll caught the attention of Milwaukee’s Uihlein family, who were in the process of developing Lakewood Ranch into the master-planned community it is today. In 1986, the Uihleins hired Carroll as CEO of Schroeder-Manatee Ranch, and she moved to Sarasota.

After her major involvement in the planning and development of Lakewood Ranch, Carroll seized another opportunity, when she walked into an office on Clark Road that advertised senior housing. Carroll impressed the woman in the office so much that the woman called her boss, Jim Cater, who appointed Carroll head of the board for development of The Glenridge on Palmer Ranch, where she now resides.

The Glenridge Care Center’s The Carroll Center was named for Carroll’s dedication to the development of the community.

“I understand (The Glenridge) is considered the finest of its kind in the state,” Carroll says. “I have had a hand in the development and design of it, and I am pleased with it.”