Viewing page 23 of 50

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

JUNEAU EMPIRE OBITUARY, DECEMBER 1958:

ELIZABETH JEAN WANAMAKER PERATROVICH
1911 - 1958

Mrs. Peratrovich was born Elizabeth Jean Wanamaker July 4, 1911, in Petersburg, Alaska. She attended early elementary grade school in Petersburg, where she lived with her adoptive parents, Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Wanamaker, who were Presbyterian Church missionaries in Klawock, Kake, and Klukwan. She graduated from Ketchikan Junior High School and attended Sheldon Jackson Junior College. Her further studies were continued at Western College of Education in Bellingham, Washington.

Elizabeth Jean Wanamaker was married to Roy Peratrovich on December 15, 1931, in Bellingham, Washington. They lived for a time in Klawock, then moved to Juneau in 1941, which became the family home.

Mrs. Peratrovich had been employed for a number of years in the territorial treasurer's office and had been on the clerical staff of Alaska legislatures. At the time she was taken ill, she had been employed the past year with the Juneau Credit Association. She was a member of the Juneau Business and Professional Women's Club and of the Memorial Presbyterian Church of Juneau.

One of Elizabeth Peratrovich's most outstanding works in an active life of homemaking and career duties was for the Natives of Alaska. She was a member of the Alaska Native Sisterhood Sitka Camp No. 4, and was an active member at all times, serving as grand president of the ANS for a number of terms, and was a member of the executive committee.

She represented both the ANS and the Alaska Native Brotherhood in the National Congress of American Indians, with which the organizations are affiliated, and extended her office in the Congress for all of Alaska. She was a member of the Congress board and this summer was called to Washington, D.C. by Arrow, Inc.. of the Congress for conference on an Indian adult education program on which she had been working. It was on her return from this trip she was first stricken with a fatal illness, but she continued with the program until it was interrupted by her final illness.

Mrs. Peratrovich is survived by her husband Roy; her son Frank, recently returned from overseas duty with the U.S. Marines; her daughter Loretta, a high school student; and her father Andrew Wanamaker, all of Juneau; and her eldest son Roy Jr., a civil engineer with the City of Seattle, and a grandson, the infant son of Roy Peratrovich Jr. in Seattle.