OBITUARY
Nov. 2, 1940 - Dec.1970
A friend of mine passed along your
great website for the PHS Class of 1958. My sister is listed as deceased
in 1970, but no other information is given. I would like to add the
following comments in her memory.
Paula Maxine Anderson left Pampa High School in her junior year when her parents
moved to Amarillo. She graduated in 1958 with excellent grades from Amarillo
High School. Three years later, by taking heavy course loads and summer courses,
she obtained a Bachelors of Education Degree at North Texas State University in
Denton. She immediately took a high school teaching position in Albuquerque, New
Mexico. She was not yet 21 and could not vote but had to control high school
boys only a couple of years younger than she. It must have been a bit difficult
because she was very attractive, but she used her 6 foot height to good
advantage in class discipline. While teaching, she fell in love and married
another teacher, Bill Carrell, who fortunately was 6 ft 6 inches tall.
They both decided that they should go to graduate school and were accepted to
Peabody College in Nashville, Tennessee. Bill pursued and obtained a PhD.
While teaching in the Nashville school system, Paula was awarded a Masters in
Education. Upon graduation, their lives and careers seemed to be heading
in a very positive direction. Bill had accepted a teaching post at Case
Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio and they were looking forward to
the birth of their first child in August 1966. Paula gave birth to a beautiful
girl, Ashley, but everything began to go wrong. Within a month after the
birth, she was diagnosed with Hodgkins Disease that had invaded her heart and
lungs. Her life after that was a downward spiral. She died in
December, 1970, one month after her 30th birthday, in the home of her parents in
Amarillo after a determined fight against the disease . She is buried in
Amarillo. Sadly, there must have been a genetic flaw that Paula passed to
her daughter, Ashley, who died of cancer at the age of 36.
I remember Paula as a positive, competitive sister who wanted to show me that
she could do everything that I could do and more, especially when we were living
on a ranch near Lefors. Almost forty years after her death, I still miss
her and feel robbed of the relationship that we could have had. She is
remembered with a tile surrounding the base of the Harvester Statue in front of
the Pampa High School Main Building.
Eugene (Gene) Anderson
Pampa High School Class of 1956
Many Thanks,
Gene Anderson
Port La Galere
France