Bonnie Lewis
Bonnie Lewis, former SaddleBrooke resident, passed away June 20, 2016 in Seattle, Washington. She moved to SaddleBrooke in 1995 from Salt Lake City with her husband Bob, whom many of you knew as a tennis pro (the oldest certified by the USTA at the time) who taught over 900 students at SaddleBrooke. Bonnie loved living in SaddleBrooke, taking art classes, spending lots of time with her pool pals at the beautiful HOA 1 swimming pool and feeding the hummingbirds that happily flew through the fine spray of the hose on hot summer days.
Bonnie was born in 1928 in Des Moines, Iowa. She was the oldest of four children of Angus and Marjory Campbell. Her father’s family company, the Campbell Heating Company, was the first to develop the forced air furnace, which was used to dry corn and vegetables (later adapted to heat houses by Lennox). She was a summer camp counselor and director and modeled in fashion shows in Yonkers Department Store. She always enjoyed the Iowa parties at SaddleBrooke. She attended Grinnell College and the University of Iowa where she played the drum in a bagpipe band and joined Delta Gamma Sorority. She studied to be an art teacher and did graduate work at Stanford University where she met Bob. They lived in Los Angeles where she taught art, Santa Barbara and for a time in Tucson while he worked for Howard Hughes. The desert seemed daunting at first, when a dust devil swept all the baby diapers off the clothesline and into the Cholla cactus. (In Tucson they lived at Harold Bell Wright estates where streets are named for characters in the popular author’s books—they lived on Barbara Worth.) They moved to Brigham City, Utah where she taught art at the Intermountain Indian School. Later the family moved to Salt Lake City where Bonnie was active in the Congregational Church, her sorority, College Club, a book club, PEO (the PEO sponsored Cottey College for women was very important to her) and as a substitute art teacher.
They had three children: Melodie (husband John Brandstrom) from New York; Mark, (wife Mary, children Kaitlin and Kyle) from Milwaukee and Jonathan (wife Joy) from Seattle. She almost always had cats whose names all started with P (Posie, Pixie, Poppy, Pumpkin—) and one beloved poodle named Pepe.
The family sends fond greetings to everyone at SaddleBrooke who made the years Bob and Bonnie spent here so happy.
Memory tribute to Rodney Ziebell
Jo Sauvageau
Some people just l eave a greater lasting impression on you than others. Rodney Ziebell was one of those people. He was a walking encyclopedia of knowledge. Rodney knew more facts and figures about more topics than virtually any other person I’ve met. And if you disagreed with him you’d better be able to defend yourself with as many facts and figures as he had in his arsenal.
Rod spent his life in sunny southern California. He went to work for the Department of Motor Vehicles where he subsequently spent his career ending up as the head of the department. After retiring he and his wife Jean move to SaddleBrooke 24 years ago. They were among the many original homesteaders here in SaddleBrooke.
Jean lost her life to cancer. Rodney was then fortunate to meet the “next best thing that ever happened to him,” Vivian. They have spent their years here living and loving the SaddleBrooke community.
Rodney was an expert and avid golfer and swam daily. He golfed up until the fall that broke his neck and the complications that set in as a result of his surgeries took his life. When Rod wasn’t golfing with his cronies he would tend to his beautiful roses and vegetable and citrus gardens. Vivian and Rodney travelled extensively throughout the United States and loved to take the back roads, make unexpected detours and stop at the out of the way towns to find the local flavor of the area.
Another passion of his was baseball. Rod was a member of the Everett minor league baseball team and traveled throughout the country playing baseball. He loved baseball and again knew everything about the players and the sports. Sports didn’t stop there. He was often found in front the TV whenever there was a baseball or football game.
He is pre-deceased by his son, William. Rodney is survived by his wife Vivian, his daughter Sandra as well as his stepdaughter Paige and stepson Stephen. Together they have seven grandchildren and one great grandchild. No services will be conducted.
We will miss our friend dearly. Rodney always had a smile on his face and a hug or a handshake to offer. He was charming, witty, gregarious and sprinted. He was blessed to live 86 years surrounded by family and friends that loved him. We were blessed to have had him enrich our lives.