Kansas City, Mo. ? Kansas City civic leader Adele C. Hall, the wife of Hallmark Cards Chairman Donald J. Hall, has died. She was 81.

Hall collapsed and died unexpectedly Saturday at a home in Hawaii, Hallmark Cards spokesman Steve Doyal said Monday. Doyal said Hall had just finished breakfast with her husband and “was working on email when she suddenly felt lighted-headed and collapsed.”

Hall, born in 1931 in Lincoln, Neb., had been married to her husband for nearly 60 years, the Kansas City-based greeting cards company said.

She was active in several Kansas City organizations, including the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, and was a board chairman of Children’s Mercy Hospital and the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation. Hall also held leadership positions on several boards, including the United Negro College Fund, the Points of Light Foundation and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

She was named Kansas Citian of the Year in 1990, becoming the first woman to hold the title. She was also the first woman president of the Heart of America United Way and was a board chairman of Children’s Mercy Hospital and the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation.

“Adele was interested in a broad range of community needs with a special passion for the needs of children,” Doyal said in a release. “She was tireless working toward those interests in any capacity needed — as visionary board chairman, energetic champion and catalyst for change, hard-working committee member, dedicated fund-raiser or hands on volunteer.”

Funeral arrangements were pending. Hall is survived by her husband, two sons, and several grandchildren.