By HDN Staff
JOPLIN Thelma Viola LaValley, 79, died Friday, Sept. 14, 2001, at a Chester hospital due to cancer.
Funeral services will be 11 a.m. Tuesday at the Bethel Church in Joplin. Burial will follow at the Joplin Cemetery.
LaValley was born Oct. 24, 1921, at Litchfield, Minn. to Hazel V. Ray and Ray S. Rudolph. She grew up on the family homestead north of Joplin near the Sweetgrass Hills. She attended the Juanita Country School and Joplin schools. She graduated from Joplin High School in 1939 as class salutatorian.
She visited her grandparents in Oregon and began work on a chicken ranch. She returned to Joplin later and worked in the local store. In 1942, she found employment as a kitchen helper in the Deaconess Hospital in Havre.
She married Glenn R. LaValley at the Bethel Church in Joplin on march 17, 1945. The lived and worked in the Joplin community from that time on. They retired from farming in 1982 and continued to make Joplin their home.
LaValley was a member of Bethel Church, active in the Martha Circle of WELCA and served as a Sunday school teacher for many years. She was also a member of the Hi-Line WIFE organization.
LaValley enjoyed her role as farm wife, homemaker and mother of three. She enjoyed traveling, gardening and flowers, and was an avid reader of poetry and farm publications. She enjoyed crafts, embroidery and board games. She enjoyed music and had a large collection of Elvis Presley records and tapes.
She was preceded in death by her parents; husband, Glenn R. LaValley, in 1998; daughter, Sherrill Honeycutt.
Survivors include her son, Randy LaValley of Great Falls; daughter, Susan Coffman of Joplin; brothers, Carroll Rudolph of Chinook, Harley Rudolph of Chester, and Donald Rudolph of Chester; nine grandchildren; four great-grandchildren; numerous nephews and nieces.
Arrangements are by Rockman Funeral Chapel, Chester.
