Betty Jeannine Thiessen, but DO NOT call her “Betty!”

 

Jeannine Thiessen Eakle was an only child to (William) Bill and Dora Thiessen. Born March 6th, 1932. Passed 4 hours after her birthday, March 7th, 2025

 

Married Earl Henry Eakle, December 1951, deceased April 16, 2019.

First born, Steven Lowell Eakle, April 1954, deceased May 9, 2016. Wife, Karen, and stepson, Paul, deceased January 6, 2022.

Second born, Mark William Eakle, September 1955, Wife Robin, stepdaughter, Rachel.

Third born, Lynnette Louise Eakle, June 1960. Husband, Michael Charles Beard, deceased May 2013. Husband, David Schulman, 2018 to present.

Only granddaughter, Brianna Jeannette (Beard) Hooper, October 1991. Husband, Marlow Brent Hooper.

Only grandson, Tyler Michael Beard, July 1993.

First great grandson, Milo Michael Hooper, December 2018.

Second great grandson, Maxwell Brent Hooper, July 2020.

Third great grandson, Mason Charles Hooper, May 2023.

 

My mother was born March 6, 1932, in Pleasanton, California, the first and only child of Dora Evelyn (Weaver) Thiessen and William (Bill) Henry Thiessen. Mom had a rough entry into this world. As was normal for this generation, mom was born at home. They thought she was a stillbirth with no vital signs and placed her in a drawer while they tended to her mother, Dora. Her Aunt Myrt, a nurse, stepped in and decided to re-check the baby. She quickly got a tub of cold water and a tub of warm water. She began to plunge mom from cold to warm, back to cold, then warm, repeat. She got my mom breathing, crying and pronounced her fine!

 

Mom spent her childhood in Pleasanton where her father’s family was also born and raised. Bill (her father) was the eldest of five who were all given birth names based on flowers. Grandpa Bill was named for Sweet William flowers. Next was his brother, named for Johnny Jump Ups, John. There were three sisters (I am unclear on birth order) Myrtle, Lillian(Lily) and Rose. Sadly, their mother, mom’s grandmother, was the talk of the town for being eccentric and a bit nuts, think present day “Karen”. Mom was extremely shy and was mortified with her grandmother’s antics and would avoid her as much as possible. But in a small town it is next to impossible to avoid people, so the local townspeople would “hide” my mom and let her walk through their shops to back alley’s to be able to avoid her grandmother’s taunts she would yell from her porch.

 

Mom was always proud of things her father had accomplished. He built a working car at the age of nine as he had a very mechanical mind. Being the eldest of five children, his mother would hand him the rifle and one bullet and say “Willy, go get dinner”. Needless to say, he became an excellent shot. He won a Winchester one in one thousand repeating rifle at the California State Fair in his early adulthood. Her father was also very musically talented. He taught himself to play every single instrument, but his favorite were all the woodwind instruments. He started up his own Big Band in San Francisco, named The Paradise Serenaders. He played all lead saxophone parts but he also played, clarinet, oboe, trumpet, bugle, trombone, French horn and piccolo if necessary. Somewhere during these years he met my grandmother, Dora, in San Francisco. She had escaped an abusive husband and was divorced, a scandal that did not phase my grandfather. They married in May and mom was born nine months later. My Grandpa had signed a contract to take his band on a performance tour in Europe but had to cancel due to mom’s birth. He was blackballed in the music world and could not get paying gigs after that. He wound up taking his instruments to a pawn shop and buying a piece of property off Main Street in Pleasanton, and built his Thiessen Machine Shop, where the building stands to this day. He was a phenomenal mechanic, machinist and welder. His reputation spread and he was the Go-To man to create, build and fix everything.

 

Grandma could play the piano and could sing well, so that part of their lives was compatible. Their love of music kept them together. When the war came, everything changed of course. Grandpa was instructed to work nights at the Kaiser Steel Plant and grandma wound up manager of the local grocery store. When the dust settled after the war, grandpa went back to his machine shop and grandma managed all the bookkeeping.

 

Being an only child, my mom longed for attention and company as her working parents did not have much time for her. Mom spoke so lovingly of spending summers away from home. As a young child she adored a woman she called Aunt Dene who had a ranch and a seafaring husband. Aunt Dene was known to feed the Hobos (jobless men roaming the country looking for work) as her property bordered the railroad. The Hobos would hop off the train and get a meal in exchange for ranch work. Aunt Dene kept a flock of geese as guard dogs, yes, you read that right. These geese were loud and mean, poor mom was attacked by these geese when she was very young, she never got over her fear of geese.

 

In Junior and high school mom’s only source of love and parenting came from her beloved Grandpa Weaver (her mother’s father). He spent time with her playing games like Chinese Checkers, which mom stayed proficient at, and learning many songs and rhymes. She adored her grandfather and missed him every day of her life after he passed.

As an older teen she got to spend her summers with her father’s brother John. Uncle John and his wife, Ellen, had five children. The oldest two boys, Wayne and Derrick, became brothers to her, more than just cousins, she adored her time with them. She also played big sister to their younger siblings, Brian, Jackie and Craig. In exchange for living with her Aunt Ellen during the summer, my mom took on most of the chores for her. Laundry, dishes, ironing and housework kept mom busy, but the trio (mom, Wayne, Derrick) found plenty of time to pull pranks on each other. Frogs in the bed, ice cubes on bare backs, beds short sheeted, etc. But mostly they just explored together, swimming in the Stanislaus River, picking berries and avoiding poison ivy.

 

Mom’s mother, Dora, was born in Iowa with one sister, Anita. They were very close. Sadly, both girls were born with weak hearts and Anita died at only 22 years old which devastated my grandmother. Then she met and married a man named Fred who turned out to be what we now call bi-polar, maybe schizophrenic. The last straw was when he locked himself in their San Francisco apartment bathroom for four solid days and would not come out, forcing grandma to use neighbor’s bathrooms. His violent outbursts became more frequent, and she was granted a divorce. She then suffered the loss of her beloved mother which, we think, made her fear ever allowing herself to love anyone again. She was very cold and authoritarian towards my mom. Very sad indeed.

 

Being labeled “the crazy lady’s granddaughter” my mom led a very sheltered and lonely life in Pleasanton. She babysat a lot and eventually got a job as a bank teller. While working at the bank she was approached by the woman who owned a beauty shop in the next town over. She asked mom if she would write to her lonely grandson in the Navy to let him know the latest happenings in town. Her grandson had worked as a stockboy/produce guy at the corner market near the bank, in Pleasanton. Mom’s best friend at the time had a crush on this cute produce guy at the market. She would ask mom to come with her to shop and flirt with this cute guy. However, this cute guy wasn’t interested in her, he was really interested in her “shy blonde friend”, my mom.

 

Thus began 2 years of letter writing between my mom and dad before they even had their first date. He was stationed in Tennessee at one point and every time mom had a letter from him at the post office, the staff would whistle the Tennessee Waltz (very popular song at the time) when she walked in to collect her letters. My dad was raised in Livermore, California as a child, where his grandmother owned her beauty shop and had her own radio program with beauty advice. In his teens, dad’s father, Lowell, ditched them, leaving dad and his mom alone on Coronado Island where my dad had to help pay the bills at 13. He got a job at the school to turn the sprinklers on and off before school and on holidays, etc. The Coronado fire department also let him assist with controlled burns. They would strap a pump water canister on his back and told him to seek and put out rogue spark fires. He was on the beach on Coronado Island the day planes flew over to Pearl Harbor. Dad was accepted into Stanford as a medical student, but then the draft came. He chose to join the Navy instead of being randomly drafted. This is when the cute, shy, blonde began writing him letters. On one of his home leaves, mom and her parents drove to Coronado to visit him. This is when he proposed to my mom sitting on those large boulders sitting roadside just north of the Hotel Del Coronado. Needless to say, many, many times over their 68 year marriage my parents drove to Coronado Island to celebrate their anniversary.

 

Being a wartime engagement, my mom had her dress and her bridesmaid’s dresses all picked out and fitted. So, when my dad called December 21st and said, “I have a three-day pass! I’m coming to get married”.  My grandmother placed an ad in the local paper announcing the wedding to the entire town. Lots of church ladies showed up to make sandwiches, punch and the wedding cake. The church was already decorated with beautiful holly, so that was the theme. Thus, mom married the one and only love of her life, Earl Henry Eakle, at the Presbyterian church in Pleasanton, on December 23rd, 1951. They spent 2 nights in San Francisco and realized no businesses were open at Christmas, except Chinese restaurants. So that’s all they found to feed my starving, skinny, sailor dad. A year later mom moved to Coronado Island to rent a room with kitchen and bath privileges until my dad completed his tours. As a navy engineer, he and his team built and flew drones that the gunners used for target practice. As a little child I told people my daddy flew “model airplanes” in the Navy. Lol

When dad was honorably discharged my parents moved to Inglewood, CA, where dad worked for Douglas Aircraft in El Segundo, CA. Within a few years he was hired by Aerospace Corporation, a private company that consulted for the US Airforce. Lots of top secret stuff. My parents bought a new home in Torrance, CA, and after 3 miscarriages, they had my two older brothers, Steven and Mark and then me. Mom’s labor with Mark was a difficult breech birth which led doctors to tell her no more babies possible. Yet Dad always wanted a girl, and somehow I was conceived, so I was a surprise pregnancy for them and I was born on Father’s Day.

 

Mom loved being a mom. All those decades of babysitting paid off until my oldest brother Steven started giving them fits. Between the stress of his antics and perimenopause issues mom really struggled with mental and physical health. Near death she had an emergency hysterectomy and lesions removed in 1971. It was a long recovery for her, but she eventually rallied and by the time I graduated high school and was working for Bullock’s department store in Personnel, I brought her an application, told her to fill it out and I had an interview scheduled for her. She worked for Bullock’s for ten years until she retired.

 

For their 35th wedding anniversary, my parents got a coupon for Fred Astaire Studio dance lessons. My dad loved it, mom was just happy to do something together. When dad retired they joined the dance studio and spent many years dancing, making new friends and competing Pro-Am. Dad had developed type II diabetes, so all that exercise was great for him after he healed from a five heart valve replacement surgery.

 

Their firstborn son, Steven Lowell Eakle, pre-deceased my parents on May 9, 2016 with a sudden heart attack. Very devasting for them both. Dad really started to decline after that so I started to commute out to Torrance every week for almost three years to pay bills, bring meals, shop and assist with doctor appointment transport, pharmacy pick ups and misc adventures. Dad became unmanageable in 2018 even with a home nurse and mom was not coping. So I moved dad out to Murrieta in a private home board and care and moved mom in with me. Sadly, dad passed on April 16, 2019.

 

In November mom decided it was time to sell her beloved home, so this difficult process took place and we sold their home December 2019.

 

I married David Schulman in April of 2021 and my mom really adored him and the feeling was mutual. Mom and David bonded quickly. David’s personality and intelligence is so very similar to my dad that mom immediately felt connected. So, the 3 of us lived together and made the most out of the time we had. We took an RV (rental) trip out to Colorado and back with my son Tyler joining us and had a great time. We hosted parties and took day trips to the mountains, Coronado Island, wildlife sanctuaries, Julian, Idyllwild and the desert. Mom loved a good day trip.

Mom lived with us for over four years. The last year she lived with us my son, her grandson, moved back in and all  four of us shared this cozy house. David had two very major spine surgeries with very difficult recovery from both. At the same time mom severely declined making me full time caregiver for both mom and David. Sadly, I had to leave a job I enjoyed very much to care for them. Then I blew out my knee and my back and I needed help, big time. We used Visiting Angels part time and that was a big help but VERY expensive. I needed to fly out of state to be with my daughter after the birth of her second boy and David was not able to assist mom in his disabled condition. I found an excellent private house, board and care, nearby. So, we moved mom into their care hoping if she improved after I returned home, we could bring her back with us.

 

Sadly, she never walked again and was completely bedbound. Mom remained under their care until her continued decline landed her for three separate, 8 day, hospital stays within a year. She declined further after each hospital trauma. Hospice of the Valleys stepped up and took mom as their patient in December 2022. Mom had so many people attending to her needs that she lived two years on hospice care.

Right to the end mom missed making her home-made greeting cards for everyone and had me buying gifts for the staff.

 

She will be missed by all who knew her, and I am sad she will miss telling her great grandsons all her childhood stories. However, the agonizing pain that crippled and eventually mostly paralyzed her over the last two years of her life, was so gut wrenching to watch that we rejoice and celebrate that she is removed from all her Earthly pain.

 

We imagine her dancing with Earl, swimming with Wayne and Derrick, and laughing with Steven. Jeannine leaves behind a legacy of love, resilience, and family, deeply missed but forever cherished by all who knew her. Rest in peace, Mom—you are forever loved.

 

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