Celebration of Life and Military Honors for Daniel and Jeanne Brosseau
Military Honors 11:00 am, Monday March 16, 2020 at Willamette National Cemetery, 11800 SE Mt. Scott Blvd. Portland. ***Please arrive by 10:30 for a procession to the committal site.***
Celebration of Life Gathering at Scott and Chris Ketel's House directly after Military Honors at 9900 SE Telford Road, Boring Oregon, 97009. Please direct RSVP and any questions to Heidi Clifford 503-312-6128
Jeanne Nickerson Brosseau passed away on January 18, 2020. She was 75 years old. Jeanne was born on January 22, 1944 in Turlock California to Ray and Lorene Nickerson. She was preceded in death by her parents, her sister Betty Scott, and her husband Daniel Brosseau. She was survived by her sister Patricia Verstegen, her step-daughters Jenny Huva and Heidi Clifford, her son Jubel Brosseau, two grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Jeanne spent her early years on a ranch in Cave Junction, Oregon, and learned to herd and milk dairy cows at a young age. At the age of five, Jeanne played “school” with her older sister Patricia, and got such a jump-start on education that she was allowed to skip the seventh grade for the ninth, and graduated from Girls Polytechnic High School in Portland at the age of sixteen.
With such an early start to her career, potential employers scarcely believed Jeanne's resume: by the end of her teens she had been a secretary at a Portland law firm, a dental school, and various hotels and restaurants. She could type ninety words a minute and write short-hand at 120 words a minute. Jeanne was working in the offices of the Forest Service when she met her future husband, Daniel Brosseau.
The Brosseaus lived in several rural locations near Portland, but while traveling in the greater Northwest, they fell in love with the sleepy, mountain-surrounded town of Livingston Montana, where they settled in 1983. It was there that Jeanne and Daniel became co-ministers of a Unity Church of Christianity, while Jeanne handled business for the lithograph artist and painter Russell Chatham.
From Livingston, Jeanne, Daniel and their son Jubel moved to Northeastern Washington, and it was here that Jeanne began a successful career in the sale of nutritional supplements and personal care items, which carried her through the rest of her working life. After a series of moves to the Portland area and other spots in the Northwest– favoring choice locations near large bodies of water– Jeanne and Daniel opted to retire in an environment to which they felt most suited: a picturesque plot of land near Cathlamet Washington.
Jeanne's life was exemplified both by a love of silly humor– a trait that goes back to her childhood, when she would see a comedy in a theater, run home, and act out favorite scenes for her family– as well as an abiding passion for justice: a hope for a world that works for everybody. She had a reserved personality, and felt that she generally expressed herself better in writing than through speech. Nevertheless, she could weave a great story when she had a mind to, and had an astonishing recollection of detail.
Jeanne shared with Daniel long-abiding spiritual convictions that went far beyond their short ministerial careers. She believed in the adage, "as ye sow, so shall ye reap," and that if one listens to the still voice inside, one will always be led in the right direction. She loved all animals, but especially cats. She was passionate about the writings of Kahlil Gibran, and Mark Twain, and the music of Nat King Cole. Jeanne was fond of telling the story of when, shortly after receiving her driver's license, she survived a harrowing drive during the infamous 1962 Columbus Day storm in Portland Oregon. Look it up, it was really something.
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