Evelyn Buckley celebrates 105th birthday

Evelyn Buckley turned 105 Dec. 13, and she expected more than 105 people to attend her birthday party. PHOTO BY SARAH ARNEY | STANWOOD/CAMANO NEWS Evelyn Buckley thinks she was born on Friday the 13th.

“I was kind of a maverick,” Evelyn said.

She turned 105 years old Dec. 13.

A resident at Warm Beach Senior Community for 20 years, Buckley was acknowledged this year as the oldest living alumnus of Western Washington University, where she graduated three times.

“After one degree I taught for a while and then went back for another degree,” Evelyn said.

Later, she earned a master’s degree at the University of Washington.

The youngest of four surviving children, Evelyn was spoiled by elder sisters who were 7 and 8 when she was born. They provided a buffer between her and their mother.

“My mother wasn’t good with kids,” she said.

Later, when one of her sisters died, Evelyn took care of the youngest two babies that her sister left behind.

“To this day they treat me like their mother,” she said. The “son” is now 80.

Evelyn said her father was a darling, “a very lovely person, but he was very gullible.”

The family doctor told him that they should move to Okanogan where the weather would be better for his wife’s health. Oh, and it just happened that the doctor had a house for sale there. They ended up in a shack in a scrub pine forest.

When she finished high school in Grandview, Evelyn went to college in Bellingham and “never went back.” Her parents finally joined her there.

Evelyn taught remedial reading in Shoreline schools for 27 years, and coordinated testing in special education.

“It was mostly to do with dyslexia,” she said. “But they called it learning disabilities.”

On the side, she also tutored people of all ages to help them overcome dyslexia.

Evelyn retired in 1972, after 33 years of teaching.

When Snohomish County organized a reunion of centenarians at the Monroe Fair a few years ago, Evelyn met some of her former students.

“One man told me that (the skills I taught him) was the best thing that ever happened to him,” she said. “We made real progress.”

Evelyn said, the highlight of her life was the year sabbatical she spent in Hong Kong.

That, she said, was an answer to a prayer.

She had communicated with a man about teaching in Japan but when she didn’t hear back from him she prayed. Then she received a letter from her friend John Silva asking her to spend a year teaching English to Chinese teachers.

“We saw lots of interesting things and ate a lot of interesting food. That was before I had food allergies,” Evelyn noted.

Now Evelyn enjoys singing at Hymn Song. She claims 78 years as a Free Methodist, and was active in church in Ballard during her career days, when she held every office except pastor and custodian, she said.

Though she insists that she can’t carry a tune.

“I can follow along with the big print hymnal.”

Evelyn wasn’t always a believer. She remembers being influenced by a professor who was an atheist, and her husband didn’t believe in God either. She first discovered the power of prayer at age 33: It was a hymn that helped her discover God.

“My husband and I used to sing tunes like Old Susanna and Red River Valley,” she said.

One day she had been wondering about God, and she prayed, “If you are real, give me a sign.” A couple days went by and nothing happened, she said.

Then, when she was hanging the laundry out, she found herself singing, “The way of the cross leads home.”

Evelyn saw that as the answer.

“I didn’t know any hymns,” she said.

She was worried that her husband would leave her, but eventually he became a Christian, too.

When she fell and broke her hip, she prayed, “Please just make me pass out,” and she didn’t wake up until after the surgery was over.

“I never had any pain with that broken hip,” she said.

Nonetheless, the broken hip meant she had to move from the trailer park into the village apartments, and later to a bedroom in Beachwood. Now she is living in the skilled nursing center where a former pastor of hers lives across the hall.

She enjoys puzzles, popcorn and bingo.

“I don’t have any fears,” said Evelyn Buckley. “The Lord has delivered me of fear.”