L.Pearl Rice Smalley

Former Grants Pass resident, L. Pearl Rice Smalley, age 88, of Brookings, died Wednesday, November 14, 2007 at Sutter Coast Hospital in Crescent City.

A funeral service will be at 11:00 a.m., Saturday, November 24, 2007 at Hull & Hull Chapel with Don Ruhl, Minister officiating. Interment will follow at Hawthorne Memorial Gardens. Hull & Hull Funeral Directors are in charge of arrangements.

Remembrances may be made to the Church of Christ, PO Box 6508, Brookings, Oregon 97415 or Southcoast Humane Society, PO Box 7833, Brookings, Oregon 97415.

Pearl was born March 18, 1919 in Grants Pass to Ernest R. & Daisy (Hendricks) Crouch. She was raised on the Rogue River at her parent’s fruit orchard where she worked until graduating from Grants Pass High School. After high school she was elected Cave Princess and traveled to San Francisco with the Grants Pass Cavemen Association. She worked for Judge Orville Millard at the Josephine County Courthouse when she met and then married R. Wallace Rice on June 3, 1941. While raising their children, she worked in various offices at the courthouse in the positions of Court Reporter, Deputy Sheriff (Legal), Deputy County Clerk, in the County Elections Department, and served as Judge Pro Tem for Judge Louis Rafferty. In her late 40s, she attended Southern Oregon University where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Elementary Education. She taught at Glendale, Murphy, and Fruitdale Elementary Schools. After the death of her husband, Wallace in October 1989 she married L. Vurrell Smalley and they moved to Brookings, where they enjoyed many years in their beach house overlooking the harbor and ocean with their two dachshunds, Lula & Schatzy. For three years she was a Municipal Judge in Brookings.

Pearl spent her time in many creative pursuits, including painting, gardening, sewing, and cooking. She loved to read and play Scrabble.

She belonged to the A.A.U.W. Rebekah’s, and served as president of the Grants Pass Women’s Club and the Rotary Anns.

Survivors include her husband, Vurrell “Red” Smalley of Brookings; a son, Richard W. Rice of Surprise, Arizona; a daughter, Barbara Rice Erickson of Sunny Valley; a daughter-in-law, Rita Rice Bolchoz of Gold Hill; a stepdaughter, Janice Brown of Prescott, Arizona; seven grandchildren; and seven great-grandchildren.

In addition to her first husband, she was preceded in death by a son, Tom Rice on May 23, 2002.