By HDN staff
GERALDINE PORTER
CHESTER Geraldine Rae (Geri) Porter, 82, died Sunday, Sept. 12, 1999, at a Liberty County hospital from complications of colon cancer.
Funeral services will be held 2:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Liberty County Nursing Home in Chester with the Rev. Curt Curtis officiating. Graveside services will be held 3 p.m. Wednesday at the Fairmount Memorial Park Cemetery in Spokane, Wash.
Porter was born Feb. 16, 1917, at Alpina, S.D., to Henry and Maraline (Gray) Hatch. She received her formal education at Highmore, S.D., graduating from high school in 1935. The family moved to Harrison, Idaho, in 1936.
On Oct. 28, 1938, she married W. Lee Porter at St. Maries, Idaho. The couple moved to the Spokane Valley where they spent the rest of their married life together.
During WWII she was employed at the Alcoa plant in Spokane. She cared for 17 foster children. She was employed at the Good Samaritan Nursing Home in Spokane until her retirement in 1978.
After the death of her husband in 1994, she continued to live in Spokane until 1998, when she moved to Chester. She entered the Liberty County Nursing home not long after her arrival there.
Porter was a member of the Carey Memorial Baptist Church and the A.O.U.W. Lodge (Ancient Order of United Workmen). Her hobbies included fishing and camping, flower gardening, writing poetry, collecting bells, and working crossword puzzles. She was an avid reader. She also enjoyed playing pinochle and UNO, and spending time with children.
She was preceded in death by her parents, her husband, three sisters, Beverly Diede, Helen Howe and Hollis Nielsen, and a great-granddaughter, Tera Whitman.
Survivors include daughters, Laurel Styke of Chester and Lela Hess of Denton; eight grandchildren, 21 great-grandchildren and six great-great-grandchildren; and several nieces and nephews.
Memorials will be given to the Liberty County Nursing Home in Chester.
