Our beloved mother, grandmother, aunt, and friend left us to be with God on March 25th, 2024. Jean was born on the family farm in Flasher, North Dakota on August 18, 1926. In 1934, during the Great Depression, her parents bought a farm in Idaho, and moved Jean along with her ten brothers and sisters to the Happy Valley District south of Nampa, Idaho. She went to Happy Valley school and Kuna High School, before attending Northwest Nazarene College (now NNU). Jean graduated from the University of Southern California (USC) with BS and MS degrees in Microbiology.
She worked as a hospital medical technologist and microbiologist in Los Angeles County General (LAC+USC), Harbor-UCLA General, and Daniel Freeman Hospitals. Jean and her beloved husband Al moved to Eagle, Idaho in 1979, where she taught Microbiology at the College of Idaho, while Al founded the Amateur Astronomers of Boise, built the scale Solar System installation at the Boise Discovery Center, and opened his workshop practicing and teaching the fine art of traditional bookbinding.
After retiring, Jean was a volunteer tutor for migrant children at Farmway Village. She also wrote articles for the Idaho Statesman , including a memorable interview with J.R. Simplot. Jean was an avid writer, founding the “Partners in Crime” mystery writers’ group along with Maureen Harty.
In addition, Jean was a mother, a grandmother, a community volunteer, a backpacker, and an enthusiastic outdoorswoman: Jean along with her husband Al and another couple, were the first four people to whitewater rubber raft down the Grand Canyon’s Colorado River in 1950, after Al had the novel idea to use an Army Surplus inflatable raft when a wooden raft he’d been constructing wasn’t finished in time for their trip.
Jean’s faith was important throughout her life, and she was a Deacon, Elder, and charter member of Boise’s Covenant Presbyterian Church.
She will be greatly missed by family and friends. Her immediate surviving family are her sons and their families: Thomas, his wife Annette, and their daughter Clarissa, and James and his wife Rose.
Memorial services will be held at 11 a.m., Saturday, April 6, 2024, at the Covenant Presbyterian Church, 5 Mile and McMillan.
Jean will be interred at Dry Creek Cemetery, Boise, Idaho.