Abbie Jane Bakony

Abbie Jane Bakony, known as “AJ” to many of her friends and “Skip” to her family, was born on January 23, 1922, the oldest child of Herald and Bula (Smith) White of Eugene, Oregon. Her brother Herald White Jr. of Eugene survives her and her brother Robert White of Redondo Beach California died in 1987. She attended University High School (Eugene) and the University of Oregon where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa. At the time of her passing she had a saying pasted to her mirror that said “Phi, Beta, and Kappa are the initials of the Greek motto Philosophia Biou Kubernetes, or “Love of wisdom, the guide of life.””

She graduated in Romance Languages and went directly to a special school in Boulder, Colorado for intensive training in the Japanese language (during WWII) concurrently becoming a Navy Wave. Soon after the war she was sent to Tokyo to decipher war documents. She met a Canadian, Leo Bakony during the 2+ years she was in Tokyo. She learned to love the Japanese culture. When she returned to the United States she began a career with the Central Intelligence Agency and lived in Washington DC, Evanston, Illinois and Seattle, Washington with the agency. Her role was to interview people who had vital information for the United States. AJ married Leo Bakony in 1958 but their marriage only lasted 3 years. Leo was an economist and academic.

When she retired from the CIA in 1977 she became a real estate broker with Trademark Realty, and also taught English as a second language classes at Shoreline Community College. She was very involved with her church – the University Congregational Church on the U of W campus. She volunteered for the church and was a great admirer and friend of Dale Turner. The friends that she made and fellowship at UCC were a source of joy for her in her life.

In 1982 AJ decided to go back to Japan to teach oral English to Junior and Senior high school girls at Kobe College in Nishinomiya. She taught several hundred girls each term, and was kept very busy grading exams. She returned to the Seattle area in 1987, and enjoyed communications and visits from Japanese friends and students for more than a decade afterwards.

AJ lived in Richmond Beach in the 1980s and then moved to a condominium on Sand Point Way in the early 1990s. She moved to Edmonds Landing Retirement Home in 2005. She purchased a small beach cottage on the Oregon coast in the mid 1960s that she loved to visit and her family still enjoys.

Her family that survive her are Herald White in Eugene (wife Phyllis), and his three daughters Laurie Perrett of Port Townsend, Washington (husband Marc), Nancy McCloud of Eugene (husband Jim), and Molly Urciuoli of Eugene (husband Jim). Robert White’s surviving family are Kay White (Robert’s widow) of Redondo Beach California, and daughter Leslie of Larkspur, California and Julie White of Boise, Idaho.

AJ Bakony’s family is honored to have had such a remarkable woman in our lives. We know that AJ had many friends in the Seattle area and we would love to hear your tributes of her.

In sadness, Laurie Perrett