Mellen Shea
Longtime Alaskan educator
and outdoor adventurer Mary Ellen "Mellen" Shea, 55, died
March 6, 2006, after a 14-month fight with inflammatory breast cancer.
A funeral will be at
10 a.m. Monday at St. Joseph's Church in Shelburne Falls, Mass.
Burial will be afterward at Arm's Cemetery. A reception will be
at 1 p.m. at the Charlemont Inn. A memorial service in Anchorage
will be announced later.
She was born Nov. 29,
1950, in Franklin County, Mass.
Her family wrote: "Mellen
lived for the past 30 years in Anchorage. She was lured to Alaska
by her love of outdoor adventure. She climbed Denali and other major
peaks and took many wilderness adventures. But her greatest recreational
passion became skijoring and dog mushing. She finished the Iditarod
Trail Sled Dog Race and made six other trips to Nome as part of
the Serum Run with famed explorer Norman Vaughan. She taught skijoring
and helped popularize the activity in Anchorage.
"Mellen was an educator
-- a teacher by birth and a teacher by heart. She taught and was
a guidance counselor at Anchorage High School for nearly 20 years,
after which she was a guidance counselor for Native Americans, employed
by Cook Inlet Tribal Council. Additionally, she coached several
sports. She also introduced numerous students to the outdoors through
many nontraditional courses, including Outward Bound in Minnesota
and Wilderness Recreational Skills programs in Anchorage.
"Mellen was known
for her bright smile, cheerful disposition and irrepressible spirit.
Mellen inspired many students and friends with her teaching and
recreational pursuits and she continued to inspire with the courage
and grace with which she fought cancer. Mellen faced cancer the
way she lived life, often comforting and inspiring other cancer
patients even as she was losing her battle."
She is survived by her
husband, Jimmy Jackson; parents, Jack and Marilyn Shea; siblings
and their spouses, Jack and Christie, Patrick and Susan, Mark, and
Suzanne and Richard Taylor; nieces, Kate (Shea) Kellogg, Heather
(Shea) Kochin, Emily Shea and Molly Taylor; nephews, Greg Shea,
Simon Taylor and Clayton Shea; and in-laws, Betty and Rhett Jackson
and Kay and Jack Lawrence of Columbia, S.C.
Contributions in her
memory may be made to The Caring House, 2625 Pickett Road, Durham,
NC 27705.
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