Beverly Arthur

Beverly Arthur peacefully passed away on the evening of December 15, 2014 after a brief battle with pneumonia. Beverly was born in Ventura, California in 1929. During childhood, her family moved to Vallejo, CA where she attended middle and high school. Her memories of Vallejo were those of many young people during World War II, and included a skyline full of barrage balloons, mandatory blackouts and the ammunition explosion at Port Chicago, Mare Island in 1944 (which was nearby). She moved to Santa Rosa to attend nursing school and later graduated from CSU Chico with a Bachelor’s in Nursing. She was a member of the startup team at the opening of Sharp Hospital in San Diego in 1955.

While in San Diego, she met optometrist, Harold Rix, married and had her daughter, Shelly. She later relocated to northern California in 1964 where she resided in Paradise, Chico, and Redding. In addition to her long nursing career, Beverly enjoyed gardening, writing, and exploring mountain and wilderness areas.

She was a loving, devoted mother and grandmother who would not hesitate to stay up past 1:00 a.m. to help a child with a school project or pitch a tent in her own backyard to have a weekend campout with her grandchildren. Beverly is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Shelly Rix Dawson and James Gregory Dawson and her two grandchildren, Keileen and Jameson Dawson. She is preceded in death by her sister, Mary and Shelly’s father, Harold.

Beverly will be dearly missed by her family, yet we celebrate with gratitude how her love, devotion, mentorship, and humor touched us all. A gathering to celebrate Beverly’s life is to be scheduled at a later date.