Nellie Davis

MILTON-FREEWATER Nellie E. Elizabeth Davis, 104, of Milton-Freewater died Sunday, March 20, 2011, at the Stateline Retirement Inn. Funeral services will be Friday, March 25 at 11 a.m. at the Eagle Seventh-day Adventist Church in Eagle, Idaho. Private interment will be in the Dry Creek Cemetery in Eagle. 

Mrs. Davis was born July 23, 1906, in Soda Springs, Idaho, to Charles Alvin and Jane Garvin (Ellison) Burton, one of six children. Her father was a sheep man and at a young age she and her family traveled during summers to various areas of the country where the sheep were pastured. She attended school in Soda Springs and later graduated from Blackfoot High School. She attended Montana State Normal College in Dillon, where she met her future husband, Marion R. Davis. They were married in 1926 in Idaho Falls, Idaho.

Her husbands high school teaching career lead them from Idaho to Montana, Oregon and finally Arizona. During World War II, while her husband served as an officer in the Navy, she worked in the Army Corps of Engineers office. After the war they returned to Salem, where her husband resumed teaching and she worked for Portland General Electric Company. After retirement they lived in Arizona for a time before moving to Eagle, Idaho, where Marion passed away in 1972. She later moved to Ontario to be near her daughter and her family. In 1979 she settled in Milton-Freewater.

Survivors include her daughter, Mona Jenkins of Milton-Freewater; four grandchildren; four great-grandsons; a sister-in-law, and several nieces and nephews. 

Her parents, daughter Virginia, two brothers and three sisters all preceded her in death.

Memorial contributions may be made to the Adventist Frontier Mission or the Adventist Development and Relief Association through the Munselle-Rhodes Funeral Home, 902 S. Main, Milton-Freewater, OR 97862.