ALICE RHOADES, 96

Alice Doubleday Rhoades, 96, died peacefully in her sleep on Sept. 14, 2007, in Medford, Ore.

She is survived by four children, Dolly Moss and Diana Murdoch of Medford, Ore.; Pamela Pedersen, of Escondido, Calif.; and Don Rhoades Jr. of Fayston, Vt. Her progeny extends to five generations: 12 grandchildren, 20 great-grandchildren, and six great-great-grandchildren, scattered from Australia to Germany.

Born in Kansas City, Mo., she grew up in Fort Scott, Kan., the daughter of Floyd Doubleday Jr. and Alice Wilhelmi Doubleday. She was close to her three younger brothers, Floyd III, Charles, and Max, all of whom she eventually outlived. After attending Kansas University, she married Don Rhoades in 1931, and lived in various small towns throughout the Midwest, including Bethany, Mo., Albert Lea, Minn., Austin, Minn., Council Bluffs, Iowa, Pender and Blair. She taught art at Goll School, one of the last one-room schoolhouses in Nebraska.

In addition to being a mother and housewife, in her middle years subsequent to her divorce in 1960, she decided to go back to school and pursue her calling to be an artist. She graduated with a B.A. in Fine Arts from the Kansas City Art Institute in 1964, then attending Boston University, where she received her Master’s Degree in Fine Arts in 1966. After that, she pursued painting as a career and taught art in New York City and Woodstock, N.Y.

In 1987, she moved to Ashland, Ore., to be closer to family. She also wrote extensively with a light and humorous style. A short story called “The Truth About Babe Ruth and Me” (he kept her pen after giving his autograph), was published in Sports Illustrated magazine, but her magnus opus was a mammoth, “Book of Ancestors” for her family which attempted to preserve family stories and lore going back for generations.

One of the more serendipitous events in her life occurred when pictures that she had taken as a girl of 12 with a box camera were years later discovered in a pile of trash behind the home of her parents who had just died, by the editor of a regional arts magazine. The editor was so taken with them that she published an article showing “the eye of innocence” revealed in the pictures, by “an unknown young girl.” Later, she tracked down Alice, then living in Oregon, and did a follow-up article about her life.

An avid reader and lover of history and ideas, she was active in the anti-war movement in the 1960s, along with other causes, and was a member of the Unitarian Church. She was a unique and unforgettable individual.

Donations in her name can be made to Amnesty International. Communications with family members can be e-mailed to dianamur@hillcrest-mail.com.