Letha Maria Wilson

Letha Marie Swart will be 101 on May 2, 2004. Her father, Riley Thomas Wilson (brother of Frank Carlisle Wilson of Portland), died in the Ritzville, Washington on February 2, 1902, during a smallpox epidemic. Doctors told her mother, Ella Louisa Hughes Wilson, that Letha would not be alive when she was born....but she was!

The Wilson family moved on to Salem, where Letha and her brothers, Walter and Arvil, and sisters, Estelle and Vinnie, attended Elementary and Grant High School in Salem. Estelle was the Cherry Queen in 1916.

Letha went on to attend Oregon State University in Corvallis where she majored in drama....she considered herself an actress her entire life. She was the sweetheart of football star, "Luke" Gill. She is a Kappa Alpha Theta.

In 1924, she and her mother sailed from Flavel, Oregon on the SS Admiral Schley to San Francisco, California and settled in Long Beach. She became Executive Secretary of the Long Beach Water Commission, where she continued her career until she was 40.

Letha was a Sierra Club Members, spending much of her early adulthood riding horse King and hiking near Yosemite with her friend, Tex, golfing, and swimming at Bear Lake. She enjoyed dancing and music....tow things that attracted her to Louis Swart....who was an accomplished pianist and fantastic dancer, having played in theaters for silent movies and being a dance instructor, as well as a Lockheed Engineer. Louis died in December 2, 2001. They had one son, Richard Swart, who now lives in Cathlamet, Washington.

Following her marriage to Louis in 1941, she served as both a member and an officer for the Parent Teachers' Association and Los Angeles School District.

Letha's eyes still dance and you can still see the drama play out as she plays balloon ball with her companions today at Necanicum Village Assisted  Living Facility in Seaside, Oregon.