Helen Grace (Gum) Westlake (1927-2012)

WESTLAKE, GUM, RHEINS

Posted By: Mark Christian
Date: 10/20/2012 at 12:01:13

THE STORY CITY HERALD, Story City, Story County, Iowa, Wednesday, October 10, 2012.

Helen Westlake, 84, of Wheaton, Illinois, passed away Sept. 9, 2012, after a brief hospitalization. A memorial serice is planned for 2 p.m. Sunday Nov. 11, at the Naperville campus of NIU in Naperville.

Helen Grace Gum was born in 1927 to Cecil and Helen Gum, in the same farmhouse in which her mother and grandmother were born near Elburn, Illinios. Helen graduated from Elburn High School in 1945, Northern Illinois University in 1949 and received a masters degree from Iowa State University. She married Donald G. Westlake in 1950 and began a home economics teaching career in small towns around Iowa and Illinois.

Helen taught home ec in both Stanhope and Story City during the 1950s while her husband attended Iowa State to receive his advanced degree. The Westlakes resided in Story City until 1961 when they returned to Illinois.

Helen's long teaching career included serving as chair of the home ec department form 1972 to 1989 at York High School in Elmhurst, Illinois. During this time she wrote five nationally-acclaimed textbooks on family living and child development which are used throughout the country in high schools to this day. Helen taught at the College of DuPage from 1990 until her retirement in 2007. She received many awards for her achievements during her long teaching career.

Helen is survived by her husband Donald G. Westlake of Wheaton; daughter, Dawn Westlake of Los Angeles, California; son-in-law, Bruce Rheins; three sisters and many cousins, nieces and nephews.

She will be remembered in the Stanhope and Story City area by former students, teachers and friends.