Friends recall Jan Reed’s humor and love of life

Friends are remembering Jan Reed for her creativity, spontaneity and love of life. Several friends shared memories in the days following the plane crash that took her life along with that of her husband of nearly 25 years, Bill Reed.

“She was the funniest person I ever met,” said her longtime friend Kathie Helser.

Helser met Jan before she and Bill were married, sometime around 1977 or ’78 and they “just instantly clicked and started palling around together.”

Bonnie Malone had the same impression of Jan’s sense of humor and fun.

“Some little adventurous thing would pop into her head so quickly and she’d just have you howling,” Malone said.

Judy Hughie and Pattie Little recalled her love of art and photography.

“Jan loved taking pictures, she loved her art work; she loved being creative,” Little said.

Lori Ketchum noted that that creativity manifested itself in “an unequaled talent in decorating, which is evidenced at the Ponderosa Lodge” (which she co-owned with Bill).

Her creativity also showed in her organization of activities for her friends — events such as cross-country skiing trips and annual horseback rides that became highlights for more than 20 years.

She also brought her lively, fun-loving spirit to fund-raisers for SOAR and other causes that involved children. When things got hectic, Jan could be counted on to lighten the load.

“She’d find something to relieve the stress and make everybody laugh and delve back in,” Malone said.

Pattie Little and Judy Hughie got to know Jan through activities with their children and the Little, Hughie and Reed families grew very close, vacationing together and sharing in activities.

“You could always count on Jan,” Little said. “When other mothers would bail, Jan was always there.”

Hughie said that that was Reed’s singular characteristic — “a willingness to always be there in times of joy and pain. That was the number-one thing.”

Ketchum called her “the sister I never had... She was the one person you could count on to be there when you needed advice or just needed to talk.”

All agreed that her first priority was her family and she devoted much of her boundless energy to her children Ryan, Ashley and Brittany. Yet her friends’ children were part of the family, too.

And she extended her interest in children to others, serving as a SMART reader for a dozen years.

Malone recalled that Jan was an avid reader, devouring historical fiction, and she wanted to impart her own love of reading to children.

She also loved animals, raising llamas on the grounds at Ponderosa Lodge. Malone and Little laughed as they recalled her leaving a note for house guests reminding them that the stocked pond at the Reed ranch in Sisters was strictly catch-and-release. The note read: “Don’t eat the fish. They’re pets, too.”

Hughie recalled Jan staging an elaborate wedding ceremony for her daughter Dana’s and Jan’s daughter Ashley’s pet rabbits and Malone said she first got to know Jan when she borrowed Malone’s pet pig to take to the elementary school.

“I think it was for Ashley’s show-and-tell,” she said.

All agreed that Jan Reed will be profoundly missed.

“She always saw the bright side of things,” Kathie Helser said. “I’ll never have another friend like her. She was just the best.”

Author Bio

Jim Cornelius, Editor in Chief

Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.

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