Margaret Winter Brown

Margaret Winter Brown (1892–1985) was an American gospel song writer whose surviving hymnological record is clearer about her work than about the details of her life. Hymnary’s authority file gives her full name as Margaret Winter Brown and dates her life from 1892 to 1985, but it explicitly notes that it has no fuller biographical narrative. For that reason, claims about her birthplace, education, church membership, or professional appointments should be treated cautiously unless stronger documentation is found.

Her cataloged output shows sustained participation in twentieth-century gospel-song writing. Hymnary indexes twelve texts under her name, including I Keep in Touch with Jesus, There Was One Song in the Beginning, When Church Bells Chime and Candles Glow, and other devotional songs that appeared in hymnals and youth-oriented collections. Authority records also associate her with translated or international instances of several songs, indicating that some of her work circulated beyond its original English-language setting.

Margaret worked closely with her husband, Howard L. Brown, a California Christian Endeavor leader and gospel musician. Hymnary describes the couple as writing many spiritual songs together. Their shared authorship is independently reflected in U.S. copyright records, which list both Howard and Margaret as writers of at least one 1935 song. The available evidence therefore supports remembering her not merely through a single title but as part of a husband-and-wife gospel-song partnership active in American evangelical and youth hymnody.