Edith Bannister Thurmond
Feb. 18, 1913 - March 11, 2008
Friday, March 14, 2008 1:26 PM PDT
Vale - Edith Hester Bannister was born at 1:15 a.m. Tuesday, Feb. 18, 1913, in Lemoore, Calif., to parents Winnifred M. and William D. Bannister. Her father graduated from the University of Missouri in 1902 with a degree in physics and came from Cairo, Ill., where he had been the high school principal. He continued his career in education, relocating to Oxnard, Calif., where he went on to become superintendent of the Oxnard School District. He served on numerous boards and various civic organizations.
They lived on Magnolia Street in Oxnard, and somehow when you heard mom talk about it, you had visions of the old South. She talked of how most Sundays, if there was not already friends or acquaintances coming to dinner, they would invite someone over from church. She talked of going to Los Angeles for shopping trips or going to the Hollywood Bowl for symphony concerts.
She had a strong interest in athletics, relating how she used to watch soon-to-be Olympian Bud Houser practice by the hour while he was in school. She said with a twinkle in her eye that her father was often instrumental in seeing that some of the better athletes went on to USC, which was to become her alma mater.
Edith often talked fondly of her brother, Martin Woodfurd Bannister. He was five years her senior, having been born Nov. 12, 1907, in Cairo.
He was innovator in the then-developing radio technology, owning patents. She related he was always bringing home tubes and wiring and used the garage as his workshop. He later went on to serve his country with distinction in World War II, rising to the rank of colonel, helping design airfields and later cargo distributions for the invasion of Europe.
After graduating from high school, Edith furthered her education, first attending UCLA and then USC, from which she would graduate in 1932. This was the time of the “Roaring Twenties,” and Edith would say she was familiar with flappers and that some of the frats at UCLA had cabins which served as speak-easies in what was then a rural part of L.A. She joined Gamma Phi Beta sorority while attending USC, from which she developed many lifelong friends. She loved her time at USC, which gave her a background in business and accounting, which was to serve her later in life.
It was also at this time that Edith met the man who was to become her husband of 32 years, Alfred Frank Thurmond. He was attending the Leland Stanford Junior University, as it was known then, and from which he would graduate in 1931 with a degree in engineering.
Their romance was, at times, long distance, and mom said that dad was always full of the best stories, which could be attested to since she once heard one of the operators talking to another that she should listen in because this was “going to be good.” They were married June 24, 1938, in Santa Ana, Calif.
Dad had graduated at the time of the “Great Depression” and had gone back to run the family farm, which he did for 40 years until his retirement in 1972. Mom worked as bookkeeper for the packing shed, the Carpinteria Public Schools and, finally, a private school, the Cate School, until her retirement in 1972.
A daughter, Judith Ann, and a son, Richard William, were added to the family. Mom lost her mother to ovarian cancer while she was still in her 20s, and her father was severely injured in a car-pedestrian accident in the early ‘50s that left him confined to Camarillo State Hospital and of which, ironically, he had been appointed a trustee.
Mom and Dad retired to Harper, Ore., on the place in Little Valley, and in 1999, she moved in with her son in Vale, Ore.
Edith loved to garden and was a longtime member of the Vale Garden Club. She also loved to be with her grandchildren, going on many trips with them. The last few years of her life she received loving care from her son’s mother-in-law, Camille Netcher, who saw to it that she made all those appointments.
Edith was preceded in death by her mother, father, brother, husband and daughter-in-law, Diana Thurmond. She is survived by her sister-in-law, Claire Roberts, Carpinteria, Calif.; her daughter, Judith Thurmond (Ken Shrewsbury), Copper Center, Alaska; son, Richard Thurmond, Vale, Ore.; and grandchildren, Nathan and Amanda Thurmond, Vale, Ore.
Funeral services are under the direction of Summers Funeral Homes, Boise Chapel. Funeral services will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, March 15, 2008, at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Vale, Ore. Interment services will be held at 11 a.m. Wednesday, March 19, 2008, at the Carpinteria Cemetery, in Carpinteria, Calif.
