Beverly J Samuels

Bev’s wishes were that no flowers be sent for her service. If you were considering this, please instead go to www.curePSP.org website and make a donation in her name. PSP is a rare disease with no cure and essentially no treatment. This organization is dedicated to support patients and families dealing with PSP and research to hopefully someday find a cure. Our mother was so committed to this effort that she is donating her brain to the CurePSP Brain Bank at the Mayo Clinic for research. Please help her make a difference.

Beverly Jane Rolston was born in Binghamton, NY on October 2, 1933. She married the love of her life, Elber (Sam) Samuels at the Missionary Alliance Church, Johnson City, NY on December 29, 1951. With this union came the role of Air Force wife and for the next 18 years, while moving around the United States, she also filled the role of mother and homemaker. She played an active role in the lives of her children growing up and volunteered for a variety of activities such as Cub Scout Den Mother and classroom assistant for special needs children. In March 1976, she went to work for Motel 6 as a head maid and stayed in that job until October 1988 when she retired to join Sam in his retirement from the US Postal Service.

After retirement, Bev and Sam took to the road in their motor home and traveled around the country for 14 months reacquainting with friendships developed during Sam’s military career. Motorhome “camping” was their passion. They belonged to the Webfoot Roos motor home club and really loved weekend campouts and potlucks with others who shared this passion.

Bev learned cake decorating and over the years used that skill to make a variety of birthday and wedding cakes as well as cakes for large events like high school proms and Boy Scout Banquets. Bev also was an avid crafter and tried her hand at many things including quilting, doll making, dried flower crafting, and painting. She built scrapbooks with photos for each of her children that documented their growth from newborn to adult. She also loved to garden. She was particularly adept at propagating rhododendrons which over time surrounded her home in Olympia, WA.

After several unexplained falls, Bev was diagnosed with Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP) in May 2007. This rare disease, which is categorized as a movement disorder, causes degeneration of the brain and affects vision, mobility/balance, and palsy of the throat muscles. Because of its rarity there is no treatment and/or cure for this disease and Bev knew that. Upon discovering the opportunity to donate her brain for research to advance understanding of this disease soon after her diagnosis, she became committed to doing this upon her death.

After fighting this disease for six years and losing her ability to walk, talk and swallow food and drink without choking, she made a conscious choice to beat it before it beat her. She still had her mind, but was trapped in a body that would not serve her. Just after Mother’s Day this year, she stopped eating and drinking. It was the only way she had to really fight back. Over the course of three weeks, her body continued to run on its own stored energy. That energy ran out on the evening of Sunday, May 26th, when surrounded by her daughter Kim, sons Carl and Jeff and granddaughters Ailea and Lynnea, she drew her final breath and joined the Lord, our God in heaven.

Bev was a giving person and her family always came first. She showed unlimited and unconditional love for her husband, children and grandchildren. She did not judge others negatively and always pointed out the positive in people. Bev lived for time with her family and especially enjoyed holidays when we all came together. There was never a shortage of food at these gatherings as she was really good at ‘cooking for an army’.

Bev was preceded in death by her parents and her husband Elber. She is survived by her children, Carl Samuels, Reno, NV; daughter Kimberley Howell, Cathlamet, WA; son Jeffrey Samuels, Oak Harbor, WA and daughter Stacy Sund, Olympia, WA; grandchildren Ailea Scarth, Karli Samuels, Shalise Samuels, Lynnea Scarth, Haley Sund, Gunnar Sund and Hannah Samuels; and great-grandchild Taylor Samuels.

We know that if you could ask her now how she is, she’d easily come back with her standard “I’m fine!”