Gladys Edith Burton

Gladys Edith Burton

Gladys Edith Crumley (Minden-Davey-Burton), Oct. 6, 1923 – Jan. 20, 2018, passed away at the age of 94. Funeral services were Jan. 23, 2018, at the Woodland Mennonite Church in Bonners Ferry, with interment in the Woodland Mennonite Cemetery.

Born Oct. 6, 1923 in Rainier, Wash. to Charles Crumley and Mary Esther Midkiff Crumley, she was the youngest of six siblings. She grew up in Yelm, east of Olympia, Wash. While working in the shipyards during World War II she met and married Submarine sailor Saron Keith Minden in 1942. Oldest son Virgil was born in Centralia in 1944.

After the war, they moved to Spokane where Saron’s family lived and in 1951 they homesteaded a small farm north of Moses Lake, where Gladys was in charge of milking 30-40 cows every day. Twin sons, Edward Alan and Teddie Lynn, were born in Spokane in 1950, and youngest son Kenneth James was born in Moses Lake in 1952. After their divorce in the 1960s, Gladys moved to southern California where she met and married Ed Davey. After his death, Gladys married George Burton, who also preceded her in death.

Gladys had a giving heart and this served her well in her career of being a caretaker of elderly and homebound, including famous 1930s–1940s movie star William Powell and several other patients, until she was 80 years old. She and George lived in College Place, Wash., before she moved to the Restorium in Bonners Ferry in June 2011. She spent the last two years at the Sunset Home. Her sons Ted (1983) and Ken (2014) also preceded her in death.

Gladys is survived by sons Ed Minden of Bonners Ferry and Virgil Minden of Sandpoint, 12 grandchildren, 26 great-grandchildren and five great-great- grandchildren.