Celebrating 101 Years: Getchell Honored At Kiwanis Club

         Longtime Umatilla-area resident Priscilla Getchell was the guest of honor on Monday when the Umatilla Kiwanis Club gathered for its weekly meeting. Getchell, a fixture in the community since she and her husband Ralph moved to the Pittman area in the early 1960’s, celebrated her 101st birthday on August 9. The mother to nine sons, a Navy WAVE during World War II, and a longtime staff member at Umatilla High School, Getchell was celebrated for her many accomplishments.
         “I was the original shrinking violet,” Getchell said on Monday, describing an early life in the Northeast that included an anonymous donor paying for her freshman year at Boston University. She didn’t return for her second, and when the war broke out the university contacted her about joining the Navy. She did just that, joining the corps of Women Accepted for Volunteering Emergency Services (WAVES). She found herself stationed in Hawaii, and in just over two years found herself overseeing nearly 70 women in the Link Trainer program, a part of the training given to Naval aviators.
   “They didn’t want us in the Navy,” Getchell said on Monday of the troubles associated with women being in military service. “But once we were there, they took very good care of us.”
          She served a four-year term, leaving the Navy after the war and settling into private life. She married fellow veteran Ralph Getchell, and when his health led him to seek warmer climates, they moved to Florida.
          But not Lake County. The couple and their family - five children at that time - to Ocala. But the need for more space led to a search for a larger property.
         “We came across CR 42 and turned left onto SR 19, and the rest is history.”
          The spot was an estimated 14 acres just north of Ravenswood Road in Pittman, a home with enough room, and a national forest to boot, for what would become nine children growing up next to ‘Getchell’s Curves’ as the switchback section of the road has been come to be known.
          After finishing her bachelor’s degree in 1982, Getchell served at Umatilla High School. For the next 18 years, she became a campus fixture for a generation of UHS students. Along the way, there was volunteering in a host of civic groups and at church.
          Getchell has received many honors during her life, including being named to the National Center for Simulation Modeling and Simulation Hall of Fame, part of the National Center for Simulation in Orlando.
          While Getchell has slowed down over the years, it has only been by a little. She remains a strong mental figure, though she admits that her vision and hearing aren’t what they used to be. But she has no complaints.
         “My life was wonderful,” she said Monday.