Baker City, Oregon
Beulah Beatrice Davis Gililland, 99, of Baker City, died May 14, 2001, at her home on Auburn Road.
Gililland-Watson Funeral Home in Hereford, Texas, is in charge of arrangements, and burial will be in Hereford next to Guy S. Gililland, her husband of 56 years.
Mrs. Gililland was born Oct. 14, 1901, at Graham, Texas, to Henrietta Carr Davis and Dempse Martin Davis. Her family spent her early years in Oklahoma and Texas. She was the middle child, with an older brother and sister, Claude Davis and Jesse Beck, and a younger brother and sister, Virgle Davis and Ouida Steward. She was lovingly called Jack by her father and went with him whenever possible.
Mrs. Gililland graduated from high school in Hereford, Texas. Her father died while she was a senior there. She attended college at Canyon, Texas, and the University of Texas at Austin, and later at the University of California at Los Angeles.
She married Guy S. Gililland on Sept. 21, 1929, at Clovis, N.M., then moved to California, where the couple had two daughters. They moved back to Texas in the early fall of 1941 for the health of one daughter.
When World War II started, both Mr. and Mrs. Gililland went into civilian defense work. They worked first in Lubbock, Texas, transferred to Colorado Springs, Colo., and later to San Bernardino and Victorville, Calif. They bought desert land in Lucerne Valley and developed it into an alfalfa ranch. After retiring they moved to a walnut grove in Red Bluff, Calif.
As Mr. Gililland’s health deteriorated, Mrs. Gililland became a capable and devoted caregiver until he died in 1985. A year later she moved to Baker City to be near her daughters.
Mrs. Gililland loved to garden and kept her family and many neighbors and friends in fresh garden produce.
She is survived by one sister, Ouida Steward of Cheyenne, Wyo.; two daughters, Betty Jo DeVeny and her husband, Bill, of Riggins, Idaho, and Bobby J. Copley and her husband, Melvin, of Baker City; six grandchildren, Charles and Michelle Bush, Donn and Rachel Copley, Janet DeVeny, Bryan and Sandy DeVeny, Craig and Patty DeVeny and Mike and Carol DeVeny; 10 great-grandchildren, Ben and Sherry Bush, Eric and Jordon Copley, and Dana, Nick, Glenn, Katie, Chelsey and Nicholas DeVeny; and three great-great-grandchildren, Skylar, Hunter and Austin Copley.
Used with permission from: The Baker City Herald, Baker City, Oregon, May 18, 2001
Transcribed by: Belva Ticknor
