A Tribute to My Mother
Joan Donna Griffith

Joan Donna Griffith
A Biography
Joan D. Griffith had two identities. As an office manager at Fiduciary Trust, she was known as Joan. But with her family and friends in Willingboro, N.J. — where her pasta improvisations attracted a fan club — she went by her middle name, Donna. Her husband, Peter, is not positive why, but he has a theory: “She was Joan on the job, I guess, because it sounded more official.”
She was the mother of their 16-year-old daughter and a mother to his 24-year-old daughter, raising both girls as her own. “That we were madly in love for 20 years is a tribute to her,” he said.
Her weekly routine rarely varied: Saturdays she went to the library and loaded up her book bag with romance novels to read, two per day, on her 90-minute commute to and from work. Reading was one escape from the stresses of Wall Street. She also had a rule that the home front was to be computer-free. They met in 1980 at Merrill Lynch, married in 1981, and moved out of Brooklyn in 1992 so that their children could experience an environment dominated by cornfields rather than concrete.
Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on September 25, 2001.
Lasting Impressions



Watched the 5 part series ” 9/11 A Day in America” and at the end of the the last Episode as they displayed pictures of some Heroes lost that day…
This popped up!
“Joan Donna Griffith” …To me..She was a Hero to many, Mother to everyone, and Mentor to those in need…Phenomenal Woman .. That’s Her!
Beyond Sterotypes - Podcast
Fond Memories




Good Memories
That was but one of my earliest memories of my friendship with Donna. We went on to have so many, many more - I will never forget her. She was such a wonderful person.
Good Grief - Podcast
Lasting Impressions


Joan Donna Griffith Was All About Family

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