Abigail Folger - Early Life

Early Life

Folger was born in San Francisco, California. Her parents were Peter Folger, Chairman and President of the Folger Coffee Company, and Ines "Pui" Mejia (1907–2007), the youngest child of Gertrude and Encarnacion Mejia, a consul general of El Salvador. Her Roman Catholic parents divorced in 1952 when she was still young, after her mother ended the marriage on the grounds of extreme cruelty. In 1960, her father married again, this time to his 24-year-old private secretary, Beverly Mater, who was already pregnant with his youngest daughter, Elizabeth, born in January 1961.

Growing up in San Francisco, Folger was interested in art, books, poetry and playing the piano. Close friends and family called her "Gibbie".

Folger attended Santa Catalina School in Monterey, California, near Carmel. She graduated with honors in June 1961. She then matriculated at Radcliffe College in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the fall of 1961. During her time at Radcliffe, Folger became an active member of the college's Gilbert and Sullivan Players, a musical theatre group. She starred in two of its productions, starting with The Sorcerer in April 1963 where she played the part of one of the town's villagers. In December 1963, she starred in The Gondoliers as one of the Contadine. She graduated with honors from Radcliffe College in 1964.

While a freshman in college, Folger held her coming out party on December 21, 1961 at the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco, where she made her official debut into San Francisco's high society. Her debutante ball was one of the highlights of the social season, with Folger wearing a bright yellow Christian Dior gown that she had purchased in Paris the previous summer.

After graduating from Radcliffe, she enrolled in the fall of 1964 at Harvard University, also in Cambridge, where she did graduate work and received a degree in Art History. After graduating in the spring of 1967, Folger took a job at the University of California Art Museum in Berkeley, California as a publicity director. While employed there, her main job was to organize the fine art museum council.