Gloria A. Kellogg, 90, longtime Monterey and Santa Cruz County resident, died peacefully at home with family present after a brief illness March 3, 2018. Born in San Francisco, December 11, 1927 to Victor and Myrtle (Sutton) Brodie, the youngest of three children, she spent her early years in the Bay Area then moved to Pacific Grove, graduating from Monterey Union High School in 1945. After a brief stint working on Cannery Row, she began classes in home economics at Salinas Junior College, where she met her future husband, Frank Kellogg, Jr. They married September 26, 1948 and lived for a short time in southern California, while Frank completed his studies in aviation maintenance. When Frank took a job with Atwood Crop Dusters, they settled in Salinas beginning their family of five children, three of whom survived beyond infancy.
While extremely focused on raising two sons and a daughter, she created a comfortable home for Frank and, in those early days, made sure the money lasted until Frank’s next paycheck, but still found time for weekly Scrabble games and frequent shopping trips with her mother. During that time, she also took up bowling, a sport she kept up until shortly before Frank retired, always successful in finding a new team to adopt her, when they moved. A number of her teams won league championships. Though less successful than her women’s teams, she also bowled on mixed teams with Frank in Salinas and Alaska.
She wrote in a beautiful hand and was adept at several textile arts, including sewing, needlepoint, embroidery, and knitting. In later years, after Frank transitioned from his aircraft mechanic career to the federal civil service, she began making many items of Frank’s business wear, which received high compliments from his co-workers for being stylish and snappy.
One of the high points of her life was the six years spent in Alaska, when Frank began his thirty-year career with the FAA. Gloria enjoyed walks in the woods near the home gathering wild raspberries and cranberries from which she rendered delectable jams and jellies. She also delighted in knitting several thick woolen sweaters, each depicting intricate scenes of the state’s abundant wildlife.
After moves over the next three decades to Colorado, California, and Nevada, Frank retired, and they designed and began construction of their picturesque California home on Hecker Pass between Watsonville and Gilroy. Though several heath problems and taking time to care for elderly parents and other relatives slowed progress on the home, 2003 saw them finally moving in.
Ever active, she made time to develop her mad passion for quilting. Frank helped her create a spacious but cozy studio in the home. Active in the Pajaro Valley Quilt Association and The Selvedges, a small quilting circle that included her daughter, Gloria made many new friends as a perennial volunteer for the PVQA’s annual show at the fairgrounds, creating and showing many of her own quilts. Aside from a memorable 90th birthday party hosted by her children, one of Gloria’s last thrilling experiences was a four-day Lake Tahoe quilting retreat last August, also attended by her daughter and daughter-in-law, while her son kept Frank gainfully occupied back at the ranch.
Gloria’s husband, Frank Kellogg, passed away March 5, 2018. Gloria was preceded in death by her parents, sister, a brother who perished in Europe during WWII, and three of her five children. She is survived by her daughter, Phyllis of Royal Oaks, CA and fiancé, Matt Innes; son, Paul, and daughter-in-law, Rita Diewold, both of Longmont, Colorado; three grandsons, their wives, five great grandchildren, three nieces and a nephew.
Private services have been held with arrangements handled by Mehl’s Colonial Chapel. Burial was at Pajaro Valley Memorial Park, Watsonville.
