Audrey Ann Ritola was born during a summer morning in 1937 on the farm of Finnish immigrants Andrew and Tyyne Maria Ritola in Alton, California. The youngest of their six children – several already in college – Ann may have seemed a surprising afterthought, but she certainly was a good thought. Bright as sunlight.
Andrew moved his family back to Indianola, on the farm on which he’d been raised, to keep chickens, grow lilies and milk a cow named Betsy. The farm was home and Annie was a farm girl with an artistic flair, the polish of education and a desire to teach children.
In the logical way of things, she had gone to grammar school in Freshwater, where she was called upon if nephew Don, just five years behind her, was hurt or naughty. Then on to Eureka High, where the big school in the big town prepared her to follow her sisters up to Humboldt Teachers College and first love.
At 20, she married an equally young Dan Forbes and became a teacher while tending to their children Linda, Alan and then Sheri in a tidy new house in Sunny Brae. She wanted to return to teaching (having been fired from Bloomfield Elementary for being pregnant), so in 1960 she signed a contract to teach third grade at Blue Lake Elementary while Superintendent Clyde Patenaude held baby Alan in his arms.
Her marriage dissolved in 1968, but later that year Blue Lake hired a new eighth grade teacher named Arthur Jones. Soon after, Ann and Art were courting each other in the teachers’ lounge, on the floor of the Blue Lake Dance Club and through love letters sent airmail while Ann rewarded Linda with a Hawaiian vacation for her eighth grade graduation. Married in March of 1973, they acquired land and built their new family home in Blue Lake, to which they brought their baby son Andrew in 1977. With gratitude for their new life together, they joined the Presbyterian Church in Blue Lake.
Always reserved and present, Ann brought a loving heart to all her endeavors, whether in the classroom, the community, the garden or with gathering family. Mrs. Jones had beautiful penmanship and taught formal cursive writing to her students. She created the Where In Heaven is Blue Lake bumper sticker to raise money for Art’s eighth grade trip. She earned her master gardener’s certificate, volunteered at the Blue Lake Museum and served as an officer with the Wha-Nika womens’ club.
After her 30 years of teaching, both Ann and Art retired together. They took several trips in pickup and camper to all corners of the United States to visit Sheri at National Parks, Kansas kin or play senior softball. Both were active in the Presbyterian Church and Mad River Grange. When Andy and Lynn’s children arrived, they provided grandparent day care and were always attentive to the needs and triumphs of the young ones.
Ann remained happy and safe in her last years, a testament to the care and companionship from Art. As her memory faded she needed him near, the place he most liked to be. Among the many lessons she taught, especially as her past became vague, was to enjoy and show appreciation for the present moment. Many thanks to the fine folks at Timber Ridge who gave her such tender care during her last year.
Preceded by her folks and all her siblings — Eleanor, Millie, Esther, Marge and Bob — Ann will be missed by her darling Art Jones, by daughter Linda Smith and her family, by Alan Forbes and wife Rebecca and their children, by daughter Sheri Forbes and her friend Tom, by Andrew Jones and wife Lynn and children, and by numerous nieces and nephews and former students far and wide.
There will be a memorial service for Ann on Sunday, May 4, at 12:30 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church in Blue Lake followed by a reception at Dell’Arte at 2 p.m. Bring your remembrances and Blue Lake handshakes.
This article appears in How the Klamath Dams came down.