Barbara Esme Jessamine Elvy Strate

She Came from Afar to Return Home Again

Barbara Esme Jessamine Elvy Strate

June 3, 1923 - Dec. 1, 2012

Born to Charles and Florence (Peck) Elvy on June 3, 1923, in Kingston, Surrey, England, she returned home Dec. 1, while residing in Missoula. The time between those dates was one of adventure, happiness, sadness, trials and successes.

Born into hard times in post WWI England, the fourth of five children, she spent her early years on Clensham Lane in a County Council home, read that as “government subsidized housing” in Sutton, Surrey. Two of those difficult early years were spent in hospital due to rickets. Not a problem to Mum as she was there with her elder sister, Diana, the closest sibling and her best friend. A quote from Mum was, “I never needed friends, I had Diana.”

Her life followed a rather diverse course in the ensuing years as a seamstress assistant to a Royal Court dressmaker, a Vogue Knitting magazine model, working in a munitions factory, which proved a dismal failure, and as a member of a professional dance troupe that performed throughout England during the early years of the war to boost morale. Therein lies the story of meeting her dashing U.S. 8th Army Air Force husband, Sherman Strate, a local Darby boy, while she was performing at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London in 1941. Amazingly, he was a “stand in” for a date with another serviceman who went on mission and asked Sherman to go in his stead.

They married in a civil ceremony July of 1942. Their eldest son, David, was born in Dorking, England in 1943. As Sherman flew missions out of Bovingdon Air Base, Mum applied herself to being a mother and “housewife“, neither of which she was born into. In October of 1944, thankfully, she thought, the small family of three traveled to the U.S.A. on board the R.M.S. Aquitania commissioned as a Red Cross ship for the war effort. Imagine the wonder of arriving in New York harbor to full blazing lights from black out in England and little rationing after a lack of many essentials. The next big surprise was attending a professional rodeo at Madison Square Garden while a classical evening of ballet took place not far away.

Before settling in the Bitterroot Valley, she traveled to Texas with Sherman for his discharge. There she learned to drive in the mesquite brush and dust, then back to “the ranch” in the valley. A wood stove, no running water and irrigating the garden proved challenging for a sophisticated city girl. Not to let anything ever get the better of her, she proved a strong and willing student for Sherman’s sister Mae, learning to cook on that wood stove, prime the pump and can provisions from the irrigated garden.

After two years at “the ranch” they moved to Hamilton, added their second child, Jan, in 1946, then to the Sula Store where the third child, Jill, was born in 1950. When that adventure ended, which by the way included housing and packing food for dudes that Sherman packed in to hunting camps, they returned to Hamilton where their fourth child, Jim, was born in 1952. Soon they trekked to Anaheim, Calif., which was Mums favorite residence due to orange and lemon blossoms in the back yard and the temperate climate. It was not meant to be, so they returned to Hamilton in 1954, moved to Stanford in 1956, Missoula in 1961 and on to Libby in 1965. It can’t be said she was fond of any of those moves although her years in Missoula provided a return to a certain level of culture, much appreciated by the artistically endowed British woman.

The move to Bigfork in 1968 proved to be one of the best as her true artistic side budded, flowered and flourished. She met friends who painted, friends with interests in antiques, friends who wanted to attend concerts in Kalispell and plays at the Bigfork Summer Playhouse.

Even though she was in a small town, the arts were available again and she knew she was home. Her artistic aspirations culminated when she was asked in 1986 by then editor of the Bigfork Eagle, Mark Wilson, to write a column about her life in the United States after she submitted a tongue in cheek letter to the editor about taxation. Thus was born the column, “Strate Talk,” an ongoing series relating a life well lived.

She was comfortable and happy in her Bigfork home of 40 plus years with a splendid view of Flathead Lake. In 2011, her health and that of Sherman caused a move closer to family in Missoula. She “cowgirled up,” handled it with aplomb and found many new, loving friendships at Grizzly Peak Independent Living.

Butterflies and fairies accompanied her on the last leg of her journey from earth to sky. She joined all the members of her English family as she was the last to take flight.

She is survived by her husband of 70 years, Sherman of Missoula, her four children, David of Missoula, Jan (Sal) Esquivel of Medford, Ore., Jil Strate (John Eisenhauer) of Enumclaw, Wash. and Jim (Anne Wadelton) of Rochester, Australia. Also surviving her are seven beloved grandchildren and many great grandchildren and two great grand girls.