Adele Kay Rodriguez Young

Oct. 18, 1950 - Oct. 3, 2024

Kay Young, 73, of Halfway passed away October 3, 2024, in Vancouver, Washington from meningitis following bleeding from a brain aneurysm. Kay was preceded in death by her parents, Sumner and Adele Rodriguez. Kay is survived by her beloved family including her husband Jim; her three children, Sarah, Heidi, and Karl; her grandchildren Warren and Adele; her sister Sally and brother Glenn; and her nephews and nieces and their children. Her favorite color was red, and not just any red but bright, vivid, primary red—hinting at the hidden depths of this quiet, unassuming grandmother. Adele Kay Rodriguez was born October 18, 1950, in Portland, Oregon. She grew up in Madras, the oldest of three children. Her parents were the local lawyer and a dietitian, both of whom served in WWII. She was Kay to her family and friends, avoiding confusion with mother Adele and grandmother Adele, but was Adele—pronounced uh-DAY-luh—at school. In fifth grade, six different teachers managed to spell Adele Rodriguez wrong, each one differently, on her report card! Kay came from an outdoorsy family, and went on frequent hiking and camping trips. One May, when hiking with her friends Roxie, Christy, and Delores, the four teens surprised a rattlesnake sunning itself in the trail. The girls took off running, stumbling on more rattlesnakes as they went. Fortunately no one got bit! Kay was a serious, straight A student who graduated with a B.A. in biology with honors from Macalester College in 1972. She first came to Pine Valley in 1971 to work as the Summit Point lookout. She was one of two women hired on the Pine Ranger District that summer and one of the first women to work as a solo lookout in Eastern Oregon. Kay’s love of the outdoors drew her to the Wallowas where she’d hiked and camped with her family as a child. Kay loved living high in the air in the lookout cabin. She diligently monitored for smokes during duty hours and thunderstorms. Off duty she explored Little Eagle Meadows and Cornucopia Mountain. With her trusty bird book, she learned the local wildlife, photographed flowers and plants, and learned to love and protect the mountains and alpine meadows, values she would hold for the rest of her life. She got to know Jim Young when he delivered mail and supplies up the rough road to Summit Point. Kay’s love of small towns and the outdoors drew her to Jim. This tall, outdoorsy guy with his love of hunting and fishing would never ask her to move to a big city, even if he did smoke and hang out in the bar at Billee’s. After college, Kay continued working seasonally for the Forest Service, while spending winters teaching outdoor school in Portland and living with her grandmother Adele. From 1973 to 1977 she worked summers as a wilderness guard. For Kay this was the ultimate job—she was paid to hike through the Wallowa Mountains! She walked the Eagle Cap wilderness from the Lostine River to the South Fork of the Imnaha to her favorite alpine cirque at Hawkins Pass. Kay also worked on the Forest Service crew in the fall, burning slash and inventorying for a timber theft investigation. She lived with Bessie Greener when she was in Pine Valley, and they became very close. Bessie, and Ella Tartar, made Kay welcome and part of the Halfway community. Luckily for Jim, as Ella’s nephew, he was always welcome at Bessie’s house. Those ladies reassured Kay that Jim was a worthy prospect. In 1977 Kay worked in Costa Rica for a year as part of the International 4-H Youth Exchange. This was a chance to further refine the fluent Spanish she learned at school and connect to the heritage of her great-grandfather Rafael who immigrated from Spain to the Imnaha River. In Costa Rica she made many close friends and reconnected with Maria, a Costa Rican exchange student who had spent a year with Kay’s family. Kay took her family back several times to visit friends in Costa Rica, especially Maria. When Kay made a friend, it was forever. When Kay returned in 1978, Jim wasn’t going to let her go; he proposed marriage on Bessie’s front steps. On June 23, 1979 Kay and Jim were married in the backyard of Kay’s parents’ house in Madras. Then Jim rowed them down the Deschutes River on a four-day honeymoon. Jim and Kay lived for five years in LaGrande, Oregon, where their daughters Sarah and Heidi were born. With Kay’s support, Jim went back to college, completed his B.S. in biology at Eastern Oregon State College, and found a job with the Forest Service in Crescent, an hour south of Bend, Oregon. Their son Karl was born a year later. Kay enjoyed returning to Central Oregon and living near her parents in Madras where the family gathered for holidays with her sister and brother, especially the 4th of July. Her children loved fireworks with their cousins. Kay and Jim moved back to Halfway in 1991, when Jim got a position with the Pine Ranger District. Kay quickly became a fixture of the community. Whether it was driving the chess team to competitions, assisting with music performances, or showing up at track meets in her insulated coveralls, Kay was always present for her children’s activities. She and Jim built a house on the hill at the end of Oliver Lane with big south-facing windows to capture the sunlight all winter long. Kay’s pride in her house’s passive solar heating was clear to everyone who visited. In 1998, Kay started working for the Pine Eagle School District where she supported students and staff for the next 26 years. As her children graduated from Pine Eagle High School and departed for college, Kay encouraged them to try new experiences, supporting them in activities as varied as flute recitals, synchronized swimming, and teaching their college classmates to butcher chickens. She was proud of her kids for their public accomplishments and for being caring and responsible people. Living in Pine Valley, Kay worked on countless community projects. She served in the PTO, running the school’s Fall Carnival to fund Missoula Children’s Theater productions. She was a linchpin of the Pine Eagle United Youth Fund, serving for many years as the Project Committee Chair. She helped organize and then ran the Pine Valley Recycling Center, planted flowers and pulled weeds with the Friends of the Halfway Library, volunteered at Jacob’s Dream thrift store, picked up trash along the highway, co-ran the needlework department at the Baker County Fair in Halfway, and recently joined the Wallowa Mountains-Hells Canyon Trails Association. In the last six years her grandchildren, grandnephews, and grandnieces were the light of her life. Warren, her oldest grandchild, was born in Minnesota in 2018 to Karl and Erin, and Kay developed a new eagerness to get on airplanes. She became an expert tracker of flight deals, taking any excuse for a trip to Minneapolis. At the same time, her older daughter Sarah was living and working in Washington DC, and she took several trips to that city, including in 2019 to cheer for Sarah in the rainiest Marine Corps Marathon in recent history. Kay was thrilled when Warren and his parents moved to Portland, Oregon in 2020. She was equally thrilled when her granddaughter, another Adele, was born in 2021. Two grandchildren within a day’s drive! Kay loved helping on Wallowa Llama pack trips and sharing the wilderness with new friends nearly every year from 2008-2024. In 2023 she and her brother Glenn took their families, including both of their four year old grandsons, on a llama pack trip to Eagle Meadow. Sharing the Wallowas with her grandson was a highlight of her summer. Kay leaves a legacy of a close and supportive family, community projects and good works, charitable contributions, environmental stewardship, and the many pine, oak, apple, and other trees she planted. In accordance with her motto of “reuse, recycle, restore” her organs were donated to save lives and her remains are being composted to return her body to the soil. A community memorial will be held at a later date. For those who would like to make a donation in memory of Kay, please support a cause that was meaningful to her such as environmental stewardship (e.g. Nature Conservancy), local organizations (Pine Eagle United Youth Fund www.pineeagleunitedyouthfund.org, Pine Valley Recycling), and wilderness hiking (Wallowa Mountains- Hells Canyon Trails Association www.wmhcta.org). Your best gift would be to emulate Kay, become an active member, and ensure these groups stay strong for decades.