Marcia Kane Haley died Oct. 13 in Sarasota, Fla., after a brief illness.

She was born on Nov. 26, 1927, in Utica, N.Y., and grew up on a small farm in Frankfort, N.Y., where she learned to love horses, frequently racing through the fields on her spirited retired race horse. Marcia graduated from Proctor High School in Utica in 1946 and attended the State University of New York at Cobleskill where she studied to be a dietician. In 1947 she married her teenage sweetheart, Stuart Haley. She had a varied career as a dietician, social worker, mother, homemaker and innkeeper.

Over the years the Haleys moved several times, living in the central New York area, Washington, D.C., and Ohio. Eventually, like other visitors to the Vineyard, Stu and Marcia decided to make the Island their home. In the early 1970s they purchased a historic 1876 Oak Bluffs property which they transformed into the Oak House, a bed and breakfast. A few years later they purchased the Mansion House, which they upgraded and ran as the Tisbury Inn for a number of years. By the early 1990s they sold their Vineyard properties and retired to Sarasota, Fla., where they became active in the community, notably the Unitarian Church and the Democratic party of Sarasota.

Marcia was a spirited woman with a quick wit and great, often sarcastic, sense of humor. She was also someone who cared deeply about social justice and human rights, a cause formed through her experiences as a social worker and one she championed over the years.

She was predeceased by her husband, Stuart, and is survived by their son, Austin Haley, daughter in law Rosemary and grandson, Justin. Other surviving family members include Frances Kane Woerpel and Robert D. Woerpel of Rochester, N.Y., and Vineyard Haven; niece Karin W. Stanley and Ted Stanley of West Tisbury; and nephew David Woerpel of Salem.