Christine Meeks

Christina was born at home on a farm near Springfield, SD in Bon Homme County on the Missouri River. Her schoolteacher then Americanized her name and she was called Christine. Later she would be called Chris and Christy, her favorite title was Christy. She was the fifth child of eight and the first girl.

They drove horse and buggy or walked to a one-room schoolhouse a mile to a mile and a half away. When she was school age the family moved to Potter County, near Aberdeen SD. While there, when she was 7 years old she flew out the buggy while going around a corner because her brothers where driving too fast. She dislocated her hip, knee and broke her femur. She would miss a lot of school and while recuperating she taught her mother how to read English. Her Mother said if Christina would teach her what she knew, then she would teach Christina the rest of the schoolbook. After Christina’s mother learned English her father declared to the family that no Danish would be spoken at home.

They packed their lunches in lard cans and often for lunch they would have a baked potato that had been baked in the school stove along with the other kid’s potatoes all morning long. In order to go to high school she had to leave home and go to Gettysburg, SD. She worked for her board and room taking care of a family with four-year-old twins, Paul and Pauline Westfall. They have remained life long friends. She remained there through high school and graduated in 1934.

Upon graduation she went to work for Northern Power and Light, where she taught people how to use electrical appliances. She became popular for making an angel food cake in the new electric ovens. During World War II she moved to Seattle, Washington and worked as a bank teller where she met her husband Earl Meeks. Six months later they where married on November 6, 1942 and enjoyed 39 years of a happy marriage.

She was an avid reader who was concerned with current events and political issues. She continued to self educate with a special interest in vocabulary her lifelong. She spent the majority of her life as a homemaker her hobbies included: sewing, handwork, canning, baking bread and gardening. She was active in Tibbets’ Methodist Church and was a much-appreciated Girl Scout leader where she taught among other things, horticulture, sewing, and basket weaving.

Eventually she went back to work and retired from the King County Treasury Office. She loved to travel with her husband camping their way through many state parks with their two girls; taking trips to Europe, Israel, Africa and Rio de Janeiro.

She is survived by her daughter Joyce Meeks Kuespert and grandchildren Bethany, Tiffany and Earl; her daughter Carolyn Meeks Parker (Randy) and grandchildren Amy (C.R Eisenzimmer), and Andy (Diane); two sister in laws Clarice Jacobsen, Lil Jacobsen Secora and 25 nieces, nephews and their families.

Arrangements under the direction of Acacia Memorial Park & Funeral Home, Seattle, Washington.