Dr. Grace E. Silvera-Thorpe

Dr. Grace E. Silvera-Thorpe (1928-2013) was born on July 17, 1928 to Donald and Iris Silvera in Gayle, St. Mary on the island of Jamaica. She completed high school in Montego Bay, Jamaica where she was influenced to start teacher’s training since a teacher was needed at the church school in Georgetown, Grand Cayman. After two years of teaching at the church school in Grand Cayman, she came to California to attend Pacific Union College.

From the time she was in elementary school, she thought it would be good to be a doctor, but when starting college, was afraid she might not make the grade. She decided to try until she failed, and she never failed. After graduating from Pacific Union College, she entered the School of Medicine and Loma Linda University as one of 4 girls admitted to the school of medicine in 1955. She passed all four years of medicine on a Student Visa, graduating with the class of 1959. This gave her the right to stay for her internship, so she did one in Maryland and another in Indiana.

On her graduation day, she married Noel Thorpe, and one year later (while in Maryland) her first son Duane was born. After her two internships, she then went to Canada and took the Canadian Boards hoping to get a license to practice in Jamaica. When she returned to Jamaica, she spent a year at the University of the West Indies spending six months in OB-GYN and six months in Dermatology. Leaving there, she got a job as the Government Medical Officer for the Parish of East St. Andrew. For five and a half years, she conducted 4 clinics in the hills of St. Andrew, during which time her three additional children, Steve, Paul and Sharon, were born.

Preventative Medicine was the greatest need in that area, so she got health films and travel-logs, and when out in the evenings to give lectures, convincing people to do family planning, and to make diet changes for good nutrition and to control diabetes. In 1968, she returned to Michigan in the US where she worked at a VA Mental Hospital at Battle Creek for two years. The family then moved to Berrien Springs, Michigan, at which time she worked in Benton Harbor in an Emergency Room. In 1974, she returned to Jamaica as a single parent with four children. The urge to go to the Loma Linda University School of Public Health brought her back to California in 1975, where she worked at what she could find to support her children while completing her MPH. She settled down at the Jerry Pettis Memorial VA Hospital in Loma Linda, CA where she started a Health improvement program along with here General Medicine Clinics where she kept busy helping diabetic patients. She strongly believed in not just traditional medicine, but alternative or preventative medicine. She taught principles of diet and healthful living. She would freely help family and friends who asked her questions about health problems. She often included advice on holistic living and was tolerant and patient when teaching the principles of health. At the same time, she lived what she preached on health. Having suffered from several illnesses from her youth, she had the compassion to provide outstanding care to patients and friends.

Grace was known not only as a physician, but as a second mother to many. She was friendly, and opened her home to several people. She had a deep spiritual relationship with her Heavenly Father, and was eager to share the love of God with others. She was an active member of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, and received plaques of appreciation from the Gordon Town SDA Church in Jamaica and the Del Rosa SDA Church in San Bernardino for helping them to get started. She also supported several other charities and ministries throughout her years including Three Angels Broadcasting Network.

Grace died at home in Calimesa, California, on May 4, 2013 survived by her four children (and their three spouses), Duane Thorpe, Steve and Donnette Thorpe, Paul and Daphne Thorpe, and Perth and Sharon Blake, and by her three grandchildren Drew Blake, Neil Blake and Jason Thorpe, and by her brother Donald Silvera and her sister Joan Linsay.

Visitation Saturday, May 18, 2013, from 5;00pm to 8:00pm, at Weaver Mortuary, 1177 Beaumont Avenue, Beaumont, California. Funeral service Sunday, May 19, 2013, at 10:30am, at Del Rosa Seventh-day Adventist Church, 1696 N. G Street, San Bernardino, California. Interment will follow at Stewart Sunnyslope Cemetery, 40 S. Pennsylvania Avenue, Beaumont, California.

Arrangements were entrusted to Weaver Mortuary, Beaumont, California.