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Eleanor came to the Colorado Welsh Society through Sue Jones. They shared a love of Welsh hymnody and music, and a fine friendship. Eleanor was a dependablemember of both the choir and of the Board of Directors: If asked to to something she would get it done. She had just taken on the position fo Secretary when her illness forced her to resign. She was a faithful student at the Welsh language class as long as time and health constraints permitted.
One of Eleanors greatest achievements, for which I am grateful, was persuading Sue to direct the music at her memorial service. She gave us the gift of Sue's time and I am glad we had the opportinity to share it with her, singing in the hospice before her passing.
Nancy Noyes
A Biography of Eleanor HooverThe Early Years
Eleanor was born and raised in Scranton, PA, and lived there through high school.Early on she acquired a great devotion for the Welsh people and their music and singing. The Welsh miners toiled in the coal mines beneath the city of Scranton, and were part of the male choirs and community groups on Sundays. This she truly loved.
College
Eleanor attended a small, well-accredited, Presbyterian college in Eastern Tennessee in the little town of Maryville. Maryville College provided her with an education based on religion, liberal arts and music. During the first two years of college she had wanted to become a Presbyterian missionary to Africa. Part of the training at Maryville was to minister to the people livingback in the heavily wooded hills; this included "hillbillies" and "moonshiners". What an education! The last two years in college were spent working toward a degree in social work. To make ends meet, she took in shirts and laundry for ironing.
Career
Her first job out of school was in Cleveland, Ohio, at a large urban Presbyterian church. She bacame the new Director of Christian Education. Eleanor also sang inthe church chorale, which included a guest performance with George Sell and the Cleveland Orchestra. A couple of years later she took a similiar job in Miami, Florida, for about a year.
At the nest stage of her professional career, she decided to move into more challenging work with the YWCA. The first stage was in an educational role and later in management positions. This required successive moves over the next few years to Waterbury, CT; Raleigh, NC and them to Pittsburgh, PA.
Her final job in the East was to East Orange, NJ. There she took a social work position at nearby Graystone Hospital, the largest mental hospital in the state of New Jersey. At this time, she was also attending Rutgers University, in the persuit of her masters degree in phychiatric social work. The pressures of her job forced her to seek emotional balance in other areas like nature clubs; she became a member of the Appalachian Mountain Club. This group was active in hiking and canoeing, from the Blue Ridge in Virginia to the rivers, trails and lakes of Maine.
A mental health conference in Denver in 1964 introduced her to the Western United States. She and a couple of her women friends included tent camping in the Colorado Rockies, and Yellowstone and Teton National Parks on the same trip. At this point in her life, she began to question why anyone would want to live in New Jersey after experiencing such a wonderful vacation in Colorado.
In 1966 Ellie moved to Colorado. Although she had not yet found a place to live, she took a position with the Denver Dept. of Child Welfare as a case worker. For the first two weeks she reported for work from her tent site at a forest campground some thirty-five miles away. She soon rented an apartment and later bought her own home. The job at Child Welfare involved certifying private foster homes for the placement of orphaned, abandoned or neglected children. She spent ten years in this and allied services with the City of Denver. The best part of this phase of her professional career was getting acquainted with a fellow worker, Bob Cameron, and later with his wife Pat. This later proved to be a very close, life-long relationship.
Romance and Marriage
It has been said that Eleanor moved out West looking for a cowboy. Rather, what she found was a temporarily unemployed aerospace engineer by the name of Don Hoover. Ellie and Don met in a color photography class at Opportunity School. The class was held in room nr. 103 at East High School in Denver. This was the same room in which a younger Don had flunked Spanish 101, some 24 years earlier. Pretty romantic stuff, eh? This was January 1968. Coffee sessions with one another after class, soon led to a first date in March, at the Colorado Camera Clubs Convention.
The romance flowered and progressed quite rapidly. Don proposed on his birthday, May 3rd; Ellie liked the offer and accepted. She has said that she was taking advantage of the opportunity that the school had presented.
Ellie and Don were Married on September 8th, 1968. The ceremony was held at the Little Chapel of the Hills at Buffalo Creek, CO. This is a century-old, rustic little church on a bluff overlooking the South Platte river near Pine, CO. The wedding was very simple, yet very beautiful. Her friend from work, Bob Cameron, played the foot-pumped organ at the candle-light service. It was an intimate affair attended by family and very close friends. The reception was held a few miles away at the Cameron's mountain home on Elk Creek. This was truly a very fitting climax to a wonderful day and a union that surely had to be made in Heaven. The couple spent their honeymoon hiking, canoeing and horeseback riding in the Tetons and at Yellowstone.
Life Together
The new couple lived in Eleanor's home in Southwest Denver for the first 8 months of marriage. She continued to work for Child Welfare. He obtained a position with Public Service Company working on the very new power plant computer systems.
In April 1969, she announced to Don that she had found her perfect dream home - -although, she admitted, it was totally impractical. It was a summer cabin high up on the slops of Independence Mountain at 7,600 feet, above the village of Evergreen. The cabin, built in 1918 had two bedrooms and two baths - oh,, yes, the second bath was a two-holer about thirty feet outside the back door! The water system was a summer only affair and the electrical system consisted of only one circuit. However, the real crowning jewel of this home to be, was a 16-foot wide by 6-foot high, one-piece picture window that perfectly framed Mt. Evans to the west. The beauty of the setting overcame the water, steep road, lack of insulation and other problems. They moved in about the middle of May, after a 3-day delay due to a recent 3-foot snow storm that had supplied enough runoff to cause a washout of a section of road up to their cabin. They named their new home, "Poco a Poco", Which is Spanish for "little by little". The remodeling and restoration of the cabin was begun by drilling a well. This project would consume a great deal of their time over the next decade and half. However it proved to be a very unique and rewarding experience, and provided them with a warm and cozy home even on the coldest of winter nights. They had learned to really live the mountain way of life. Recreation was provided by birding walks and hikes right around Evergreen. Vacations were spent hand-digging a new septic system and leaching field one year, and tent camping elsewhere on an alternate year.
Life in Evergreen
Life in Evergreen was very good. It was then a small town with a wonderful cross-section of people who were very nature-oriented. Ellie and Don were attracted to this type of people. Early on, they joined the newly-formed Evergreen Naturalists. No, it wasn't a nudist camp, but rather a bird lovers organization that later became associated with the National Audobon Society. It was a wonderful group of people who truly inspired the new-comers. The relationships were to last a lifetime. This was true of so many of Eleanor's friendships, not just in Evergreen but everywhere.
Other relationships that she had were with the Evergreen Animal Protective League and the Mt. Evans Hospice. After her early retirement from Child Welfare in 1976, she was able to devote a lot more time to volunteer work with these groups. She thrived on being able to help and care for others, human as well as animal.
About a dozen years or more ago, Ellie and Don met Sue and Berwyn Jones at a Weight Watchers meeting in Evergreen. This chance meeting led to a wonderful, long-term friendship. The Joneses were active in the Colorado Welsh Society and Sue had started the marvelous Welsh Choir. Eleanor really loved singing in this choir, and remained active with it as long as her health permitted.
The Final chapter
The Hoovers moved to Arvada in 1992 after 23 wonderful years in Evergreen. After Don's retirement, they traveled all over North America in their 20-foot Toyota based motorhome. Places visited included the Pacific Northwest, Alaska, the Yukon and Northwest Territories, Labrador, Newfoundland, the Canadian Maritimes & Florida, and to most places in between. It took a number of trips to cover all of this territory. The most recent really long trip was to Newfoundland and Labrador. When you drive from Denver to St. Johns, Newfoundland, you are over half the way to the City of London. This was a three and one-half month trip that covered 12,000 miles. It even included a stop in Milwaukee on the way home to sing in the National Welsh annual songfest (Gymanfa Ganu Genedlaethol). What a thrill it was to be a part of 900 voices singing all those beautiful hymns. Upon returning home, Ellie was occasionally asked if we were still married after 105 days together in a 20-foot rolling box. Her answer always was, "Yes, and we are still madly in love, and are closer physically, emotionally and spiritually than ever".
This then is some insight into the life of the lady Named Eleanor, who was dearly loved by all who really knew her. She felt strongly that this most recent trip, this Great Adventure into the unknown, was merely a turning of the next Page of the Book of Eternal Life.
Her earthly remains are in the beautiful cemetary at the Little Chapel of the Hills. And the waters of the river will flow silently by below the bluff, just as they have for a thousand years and the love and peace of this place will let us all know that all is well.
Compiled by Don Hoover
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Page created: May 26, 2001 and modified: Jan. 25, 2003