- Date Of Birth: April 4, 1924
- Date Of Death: September 28, 2015
- State: Colorado
HELEN LOUISE NEILSON WHEATLEY DENSMORE
The LAST of her generation, passed into the Spirit World on Monday, September 28,2015 at the Colorado Canyons Hospital and Medical Center in Fruita, Colorado. We know she is participating in a wonderful reunion with those who went before her and we know she is happy.
Mom was born April 4, 1924 in El Segundo California to Thomas Leslie Neilson and Lucy Eagar. She described her dad as a “horse trader” (not really horses, but stuff) and like the gypsies they moved a lot. Her parents and siblings at the time Lucile, Faye, and Gerry moved to Utah, Kanab and Salt Lake City, then to a place she has fond memories of—Aunt Mauretta’s to harvest potatoes and beets and play in the leaves on the lawn and eat homemade bread and thick cows cream with sugar! They also lived in Snowflake, Flagstaff, Cottonwood, Lindon, Phoenix, Thatcher, Claysprings, Holbrook, Joseph City, Chino Valley, Cornville, Kingman, Lakeside, and Peoria, Arizona! They also lived in Cortez, Colorado, Idaho, and California. Along the way with these travels they added her brother Tom and sister Betty. She grew up during the depression and jobs were hard to find.
When she was 14 and living in Chino Valley she graduated from the 8th grade. Years later as a married woman she completed her GED and was quite proud of it. Some of mom’s friends were Valine Arizona Sanders, Flora Johnson Evans, Dora Jackson, and Virginia Clark. Each helped her enjoy those growing up years.
In 1941, her friend Virginia introduced her to Neil Johnson, she was 17. He was a painter for the Santa Fe Railroad. She dated him for about 2 months. One morning, December 7th She and Neil and Virginia and her fiancé, were eating at a restaurant when the radio announced the attack on Pearl Harbor. The two men got up from the table, never finished breakfast and went to sign up for the Army. She never saw Neil again.
When mother’s child was born she named her Virginia Lee. In the 40’s it was still thought that a young woman could not take care of a child alone so her parents adopted Virginia “Gina”. Their bond has been strong through all the years of each other’s lives.
She moved to Tempe, AZ and worked for the Borden Milk Company. It was here that she met Sue Lang, her life long friend. Together they worked at Falcon Field in Mesa, and at William’s Air Force Base in Chandler.
While at Williams, she met William Neal Wheatley of Wise Virginia. They were married Sept 14, 1944. He was later deployed to Alaska to do cold weather testing on air planes. By then they had two children, Billie (born in Mesa AZ) and Judy (born in Watertown South Dakota. When Bill returned from Alaska they moved to Winslow, Taylor, and Snowflake AZ where Sue was born.
Sometime after Sue was born they took a train to Tennessee to live with Bill’s family and then to Salyersville KY to live next door to Bill’s Sister Rossie and her family. At this time mother was staying home caring for the children and this is where Russell was born. Bill worked sawmills and in a car factory in Columbus Ohio. When the jobs played out Helen wrote to her dad and he sent her $125 dollars to bring her and the four kids to AZ. They boarded a train and traveled back to AZ. When Bill earned his ticket he followed. They lived in Wickenburg AZ where she met another friend Helen Willis. Together they were waitresses in the area to help supplement the income for their families.
Our family moved to Prescott, then back to Wickenburg, where Lynne was born, and finally back to Prescott. It was in Prescott that Jim and Tim were born when the older kids where teenagers. Her daughter Judy was friends with a girl named Peggy Braffet.
While in Prescott, she worked at a dry cleaner as a seamstress and as a wool presser (hard work). She ironed clothes for people and worked as a retail clerk in the Canteen at the VA Hospital.
She divorced Bill in 1963. Some months later she met Hank Densmore and married him 25 Jan 1964. They eventually built a home in Chino Valley where they lived until Hank died in 1976. She sold the house and moved back into Prescott and purchased a trailer on Oak Terrace Dr. where she lived and worked for over 23 years.
Her family and friends came often to this address and loved the cool weather of Prescott. She had many friends and even boyfriends but never married again. She retired in 1989 and became involved with the Eagles Lodge.
Helen loved people, especially her family, and was always welcoming them to her home. She loved to dance, play bingo, camp, read and cook (good cook). When her own place became too much she lived in the Samaritan Towers and the Pioneer Home in Prescott. She loved all of these places and the friends she made there. She loved to travel and when she couldn’t, drove the country side where she lived. As her health declined she went to Colorado to live and it was there she died, always with a dream of going back to her beloved Arizona. She is preceded in death by two husbands, and four children, Sue, Russell, Lynne and Jim and granddaughter Tammy.
