Reflecting back on her 100 years of life and her career, former Washington State news reporter, Grace Weber, said her biggest accomplishment was during the years she worked as a newspaper reporter for both the Spokane Chronicle and the Wenatchee Daily World. She had always been interested in communication and was assigned to provide coverage of the Grand Coulee Dam project.
“That was a fascinating story! Everyone was interested in the latest news of the project,” Weber recalled. She drove all over the Columbia Basin area. Her own son taught her press photography that he had learned himself while in the Army. The cameras, and the slides, were very large. “I would transport the latest photographs and stories by train or bus to get them published the very next day in Wenatchee and Spokane.”
Weber was born in Salt Lake City, Utah on June 17, 1911. The oldest of five siblings, she and her family moved to Alberta, Canada at the age of 2.
She lived in Canada through her elementary school years and feels she was fortunate to have had an excellent educational experience. At that time, Weber said the Canadian schools were much more efficient than in the U.S. and her English teachers were so very good that she feels it contributed to her ability to gain a career as a news reporter later in life without obtaining a college degree.
While in her teens, the family moved to Seattle where she graduated from Highline High School in 1929. This period marked the beginning of the Great Depression, and while in high school she secured a job in a Woolworth’s store. She was the only one in her family of seven who had a job and worked to support them all.
“Young people today do not know what it was like to be in tough times. Those were tough times,” Weber said. She recalled feeling quite fortunate to earn money when jobs were so hard to come by. A family friend who worked in a bakery took small amounts of leftover bread and saved it in a bag, then about once a week, he would bring it to the family’s home and this was, sometimes, nearly all they had to get by on.
Weber soon met a gentleman named Bill Mayer who she married and together they had a son, Pat. They eventually divorced and later, Weber traveled to Kodiak, Alaska where she took a correspondence course and worked during WWII.
All the women were evacuated to Seattle at one point during the war, which happened to be where she came from. She went to work for the Tacoma shipyards. There she was in charge of pipes and fittings used by destroyers during the war.
She later moved to Eastern Washington, where she met and married Henry P. Weber and there she gave birth to twin girls, Stephanie and Sybil. Weber says this was the happiest time of her life. She lived on a wheat ranch with her young family and secured a job as a newspaper reporter for the area.
She found the work very interesting. She also developed a love for gardening and still enjoys it today and is happy to have a small garden patch she cares for at her current home, in the Gardens at Juanita Bay Senior Community, in Kirkland.
Another source of enjoyment for Weber was music. “Before TV we had to entertain ourselves. I had a great musical education, learned to play the piano and became a soloist.”
Weber played and sang for numerous weddings and events. Many of her friends today talk of her beautiful singing voice. “You don’t keep those talents after 100 years, some days I sound pretty good and other days I can’t control my voice,” she said.
When asked what the most challenging part of her life was, Weber said, “If you are alive there are always challenges you will face. I have been healthy and inherited a pretty good mind. I have been active and interested in life and basically learned life is worth living.”
Denise Stuth is the marketing director for Gardens at Juanita Bay in Kirkland. Contact her at 425-823-0410.
