Everyld M. Anderson Lee 1918-1998

LEE, ANDERSON, REID

Posted By: Merllene Andre Bendixen (email)
Date: 7/6/2012 at 21:12:18

Everyld Lee
Estherville – Memorial services for Everyld Anderson Lee, 79, of Estherville will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, June 13, at Henry-Olson-Fuhrman Funeral Home in Estherville. Interment will be in Oak Hill Cemetery. She died Thursday, May 14, 1998, at Rosewood Manor after a lengthy battle with lung disease and Alzheimer’s.

She was born July 23, 1918 in Gruver, the daughter of Violette Reid and Orlando Logan Anderson. When she was ten, the family moved to Estherville, where her father managed Northern Lumber and then co-founded Anderson-Schenk, which is now Estherville Paint and Glass.

In Estherville schools she excelled in music and mathematics. By high school she was playing the piano, organ and xylophone in the band. She also sang in school groups and the church choir. She was principal organist at the Presbyterian Church until the end of World War II and substitute organist into the 1980’s. She was director of church youth choir during the 1950’s. She graduated from high school in 1935 as valedictorian of her class and from Estherville Junior College in 1937 with highest honors. She kept books for Deemer Lee who had founded the Estherville Daily News in 1929 They were married July 12, 1938.

While she never lost her taste for bookkeeping, she turned her attention in the 1940’s and 1950’s to raising a family and volunteering her time to the Lincoln School PTA, the local Republican Party and the Holy Family Hospital Auxiliary.

She was a loyal patron of the Estherville Public Library, a member of AY Chapter of PEO and enjoyed playing bridge. She was an excellent swimmer and golfer, winning the annual championship at the Estherville Golf and Country Club five times between 1954 and 1974. She was runner up three times.

Her husband finished the manuscript of Esther’s Town, a history of Estherville, before he died, but it had not yet been accepted for publication. She shepherded the book into print and helped Iowa State University Press promote it.

Survivors include son Robert, his wife Susan Ashley and their sons, William and Matthew, of Colorado Springs; and son William, his wife Beverly and children Carrie and Logan of Laguna Niguel, Calif.; sister-in-law Irene Anderson, Estherville.

She was preceded in death by her husband in 1979 and one brother, William O. Anderson, in 1996.

In lieu of flowers the family suggests gifts to the Estherville Public Library, Presbyterian Church of Rosewood Manor gazebo fund. (Estherville Daily News, Estherville, IA, May 15, 1998)