Louela Ophelia Taylor passed away Jan. 24, 2007, in Bellingham, Wash.

She was born June 30, 1925, in Deville, La., to Benjamin H. and Laura (Wilson) Smith. Following high school, she earned a bachelor degree at John Brown University in Siloam Springs, Ark.

In the early 1950s, she and her husband, Andrew Taylor, whom she married in 1947, set out as missionaries to the Alaska Territory with their two small children. They built a church in Valdez and later homesteaded near Anchor Point on the Kenai Peninsula. Louela taught school to help support the family. Their years on the homestead, even without running water and electricity, were among her most precious memories. She fondly recalled picking wild berries, catching salmon and reading aloud by the fireside on long winter evenings.

In the 1960s, they lived closer to their families in Louisiana, where she taught high school English and her husband pastored several churches. They eagerly returned to their beloved Alaska in 1970, to teach and minister with Alaska Village Missions. Upon retiring in 1983, Andrew and Louela moved to Sedro-Woolley, Wash.

Throughout her life she enjoyed crafts, gardening, putting up the harvest, entertaining grandchildren and extending hospitality to many. In addition to various church activities, she wrote and directed numerous church drama productions. She probably wouldn’t have slowed down at all had Parkinson’s disease not limited her activity so drastically in her last few years.

Louela is preceded in death by her parents, two siblings, and son James. She is survived by sons, Roy Taylor and his wife, Nancy, of Bellingham, Wash., and John Taylor and his wife, Cynthia, of Homer; daughter Joan Bousque’t and her husband, Jeff, of Anchorage; eight grandchildren; and four siblings.

A memorial service will be held at 4 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 3, at Northern Peaks Christian Fellowship, 118 North Ball St., Sedro-Woolley, Wash. Viewing will be at Greenacres in Ferndale, Feb. 1, from 9-10 a.m. Memorials may be given in Louela’s name to Northern Peaks Christian Fellowship.

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