Helen Frances Barbee

HELEN FRANCES BARBEE Funeral services for longtime area resident Helen Frances Barbee will be held at 10 a.m. on Monday, September 26 at the Church of Christ located at 631 E. Montezuma Avenue in Cortez. Interment will follow at Arriola Cemetery. Visitation has been scheduled for Sunday afternoon from 3 to 5 p.m. at Ertel Memorial Chapel. Helen was born at Cheraw, Colo. the fourth daughter of Alva Fred and Lela Belle (Brown) Nichols. She passed away Tuesday, September 20, 2016. Helen attended all twelve grades in the same school graduating in 1937. She met Tom Barbee in 1935 and they were married in 1937. To this union four children were born, James, Rayma, Gayle and Robert. The family resided on a farm owned by the American Chrystal Sugar Company. In 1951 they moved to the Western Slope and Montezuma County. They bought a farm in what was then called Northern Lakeview. This is where Helen still lived. She loved people and worked with a number of them in the 33 years she worked for J.C. Penny. She was a long time member of the Church of Christ and attended as long as possible. Helen is survived by her children, Gayle (Grady) Gardner of Dolores and Robert Barbee of Dolores; her son-in-law, Galen of Bluff, Utah; seven grand-children, four step grand-children, 23 great grand-children and 15 great-great grand-children. She was preceded in death by her parents; her husband, Tom in 1989; her children, James in 1996, and Rayma in 2009; her sisters, Pauline Switser, Irene Cook, Ferne Donovan, and her grandson, Stan Percell in 2015. Donations can be made to the Four Corners Youth Camp-Dolores, the Church of Christ, or Rocky Mountain Children's Home-Longmont.