Bailey, Ellen M.

ELLEN LIVED! Ellen Marie Pinching Bailey was born May 21, 1930 in Washington DC at the height of the Great Depression to Daniel Wildbore Peacock Pinching and Thelma Durer. She grew up during the war years, as a child organized material drives with her friends for the war effort. This set the course for a lifetime of volunteering and the helping of others. Spending her summers at the parents' cottage on Chesapeake Bay, Ellen became a seasoned sailor, as a young woman even won the President's Cup in her star class boat., "The Thistle." She attended George Washington University. Her employment included such jobs as draftsmen for classified government projects for the US Navy. They married August 8, 1952 in Washington DC and moved to Michigan where they raised a daughter and 2 sons. Ellen was an artist at heart and successfully mastered painting, drawing, sculpture, pottery, and gardening. She was a devoted mother and homemaker. She worked for and returned from the Henry Ford Museum and a pottery/ historian/ teacher. Her work at the museum now adorns the homes of such persons as Gerald Ford, John Engler, the Chinese Prime Minister, and the Chairman of Honda Motors. Ellen also loved volunteering and throughout her life gave her time for numerous organizations such as the Red Cross, Girl & Boy Scouts, Muskegon Art Museum, Detroit Institute of Arts, and the Muskegon Yacht Club. She was a devoted grandmother who never tired of getting on the floor and playing for hours as a peer and creative mentor. After residing in Pleasant Ridge for 40 years, she moved to the Bluffton neighborhood and in traditional Bluffton fashion met everyone and became a good neighbor and fast friend to all that she knew her. She is survived by daughter Laura Ellen Burke and her husband Doug of Pleasant Ridge, MI; son, Charles Owen & wife Gwen and grandchildren, Gwen, Owen, & Madie of Basalt, CO; and son Daniel and grandchildren, Jesse & Isabel of Bluffton, MI. Mom, thank you for everything you taught us about friendship, art, music, compassion, kindness, and tolerance. Assuredly you will be granted fair weather on your new voyage. "I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, and all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by and all I ask is a merry yarn from a fellow rover and a quiet sleep and sweet dream when the long tricks over" Sea-Fever by John Masefield. Memorial Service - A celebration of Ellen's life will be held at the Muskegon Yacht Club October 8, 2006, 2 to 4 pm. Memorials: Muskegon Art Museum "Ellen Bailey/Centen-nial Fund" 296 W. Webster Ave., Muskegon, MI 49441.