Dorothy Powell
Dorothy Powell
Dorothy Powell, Salkum, celebrated her 90th birthday Saturday, May 30, with a family party at the Virgil R. Lee Building in Chehalis, hosted by her three surviving children. They are Harold Powell and Ellen Berdan, Salkum, and Diane Taylor, of Tenino.
Powell had seven of her 13 grandchildren in attendance, and 12 of her great-grandchildren, coming from as far as Alaska.
Those unable to attend are encouraged to call or write her; her actual birthday is today.
Powell was born June 6, 1925, at her aunt’s Chehalis home. She is a lifetime Lewis County resident, and has lived in her current Salkum home since 1948.
Powell went to first grade at the Swofford School across the road from where she lived. Her father had donated the land for the school.
The following year, when Mossyrock consolidated, she attended school there through her senior year in high school, graduating in 1943 as class valedictorian.
She married Harold Powell, of Salkum, on Feb. 8, 1943, three days before he was drafted into the Army during World War II. Harold died May 11, 2014. They had been married 71 years.
After Dorothy graduated from high school, she was able to follow Harold to Texas, Pennsylvania and Florida to his various locations of training.
Dorothy then returned home and went to work at the Boeing plant in Chehalis during the war, at first as a riveter’s assistant and then in the office for the general manager.
After the war was over she worked a short time at J.C. Penny in Chehalis until Harold came home. They lived in Seattle for a while when he went to school, but that time was cut short when their first child arrived.
They later bought their current home in Salkum in 1948, where they have lived for the past 67 years. Dorothy was a homemaker, and she and Harold raised six children. She has lost three of her children, Gary Powell in 1997, Elaine Jasperson in 2010 and Linda Welch in 2011.
Dorothy had a huge garden for many years and enjoyed cooking for her family and her friends. She loved to camp in the mountains with her husband and family and pick huckleberries. She enjoys reading and visiting with family and friends. She and Harold also enjoyed traveling to Alaska to visit family, and made a trip to Hawaii with their son Gary and his family shortly before he was killed in a logging accident.
