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Eva Ann Rydalch Dalton ’46

April 11, 2019, in Portland, of heart failure.

Born in Portland, Ann grew up in the Laurelhurst area. As a child, she traveled with her parents around the country, and these adventures instilled in her a love of travel. She gained a lifelong love of swimming from her father. In high school, her greatest wish was to study chemistry at Reed, which she did. She wrote her thesis, “The Growth of Microorganisms upon Lignin and Sulfite Waste Liquor,” advised by Prof. Arthur F. Scott [chemistry 1923–79].

After graduating, she worked for a laboratory in California, then moved back to Oregon to earn a master’s in chemistry from Oregon State University. While working as a teaching assistant, she met Charles Dalton, also a student at OSU. They married after receiving their degrees and both began teaching careers in Bonanza, a small town in southern Oregon.

They made lifelong friends in Bonanza, but Ann hankered for something new. So,  in 1959, when Chuck was offered a teaching job at Kamehameha School in Honolulu, Hawaii, they hopped on a prop plane with their two daughters and flew to that tiny dot in the middle of the Pacific.

Ann taught chemistry (and later math) at Punahou School, a college prep school. Ann and Chuck loved living in Hawaii and made great friends. They added a third child to the family (a boy, born in the same hospital as Barack Obama). When the children were older, they took them to Europe nearly every summer, gadding about on the cheap. Ann was in heaven. 

After the children had left home, Ann and Chuck divorced. She continued to teach at Punahou, and the day after she retired, she left on a plane and spent the next year traveling by herself around Europe. Eventually, she settled back in Portland, near her daughters. She enjoyed her volunteer work for Portland Rescue Mission, the Red Cross bloodmobile, the Washington Park host group, and Store-to-Door, and loved spending time with other people. Twice a year, she found time to travel. 

At home in her condo, she swam regularly and read widely until the last months of her life. Ann is survived by her three children, Carolynn Cohrs, Susan Dalton ’81, and Craig Dalton.

Appeared in Reed magazine: September 2019

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