Alice Cottam (Hatch) Tollestrup

On Sunday, September 6, 2020, Alice Hatch Tollestrup, loving mother of four children passed away at the age of 97, in Albuquerque, NM. Alice was born on January 14, 1923, in Scipio, UT, to the late Lottie C. and Frank S. Hatch. She received her bachelor’s degree in chemistry from University of Utah in December 1944. In February 1945, she married Alvin Virgil Tollestrup of Salt Lake City, UT. They raised one daughter, Kristine and three boys, Kurt and the twins, Eric and Carl. Alice delighted in her employment as a medical technologist and retired in 1988 after working 15 years at the Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital. She resided in Albuquerque, NM since 1993.

Alice was born on January 14, 1923, in Scipio Utah. She was delivered at home under the supervision of aunt, Carrie Hatch who was a midwife and the nurse responsible for the health of the community. Alice lived in a large family with her sisters, (Mary, Anne, Charlotte, Helen, Kathleen and Johnette); and her two brothers, (William and Frank).

Alice always thought of herself as an independent minded child and did not like to be told what to do. In her youth she was called “ornery” by a neighbor, but then, many decades later, he apologized and said that he meant “willful”. She grew up in Scipio and lived there until she was eighteen. For the first five or six years of her life there was no electricity, no telephone, and no indoor plumbing. There was, however, a single tap in the kitchen that supplied the house with water. Alice remembers that bathing was done in a large tub in the middle of the front room, and she often complained that, as the youngest, the water was always unpleasantly dirtied by her older siblings.

Early on, water was supplied by a windmill in the back yard, but by the time Alice came on the scene the well was covered by boards and the windmill had been taken down. She did remember peering through a crack in the boards and seeing the water. In 1929, the US Government instituted the Rural Electrification Project which brought electric power to underserved areas all across America. One of the first households to receive power was the Frank S. Hatch residence, and soon after the house was also wired for telephone service. After Mary started working, she made it possible to install indoor plumbing.

Alice was a good student and spent eight years at Scipio Elementary School. In the seventh grade, her sister, Mary purchased a clarinet for her. A music teacher from the high school came to Scipio once a week and taught the few local students who had an instrument. That instruction enabled Alice to play four years in the Millard High School Band. In addition to playing in the band, she was on the debating team for three years and was the co-editor of the high school newspaper. She was an excellent student and was selected to be the valedictorian for the senior class graduating from Millard High School in 1941.

In the fall of 1941, she enrolled at the University of Utah. She received a $25.00 scholarship which helped pay for tuition during the first year. The US Government had a program called NYA which helped pay for the students’ education. To cover additional expenses, she worked for the first year as a secretary for Dr. Bonner who was the head of the Chemistry Department. Beside typing letters for him, he had her practice using a Mettler Balance, which was used to weigh materials that were used in experiments. For this, she received the magnificent sum of $0.37 per hour. Later she taught one of his small sessions in laboratory chemistry, including one session that had nursing students.

Her freshman year was busy as she also played clarinet in the University Marching Band. The band was all set to go to Hawaii with the football team in December of 1942, but the bombing of Pearl Harbor changed all those plans. There was soon an exodus of young male students who were drafted into the various branches of armed services, which really changed the complexion of her classes. By the time she graduated there were only four students in one of her math classes – two boys and two girls. One of the boys said that the only reason the girls got A’s was because they were girls. Perhaps it was difficult for him to admit that maybe they were also smarter or worked harder – something that was so characteristic of Alice’s personal belief system.

In 1942, she met Alvin who was a Physics student who had classes in the same building as she. They dated until Alvin joined the Navy in early 1944, but because Alice enrolled in summer semester that year, she was able to finish studies early in December 1944. She graduated with a Major in chemistry and a minor in mathematics. She left in February 1945 to travel to New Jersey to marry Alvin, who was, by then, an ensign in the Navy. They were married at the home of Alvin’s relatives – aunt, Ruth (his mother’s sister) and uncle, Tom Smith. They honeymooned at the St. Moritz Hotel overlooking Central Park in New York City.

The newlyweds moved to Boston where Alvin received more schooling in radar and electronics at MIT and Harvard, and then returned to New York for even more training. After 6-weeks in New York City, Alvin was assigned duty on the battleship USS Massachusetts which was moored at Bremerton Navy Yard in Washington State. Initially, Alice could not join him, so she stayed in New Jersey with her in-law relatives for a short while. She did, however, go to see him for the month of December where they lived in Port Orchard. For the nights that Alvin had to stay on board the ship, Alice would go on board to have dinner with him in the officers dining hall.

In about March, Alvin was assigned to the Navy facility at Treasure Island in San Francisco where Alice once again joined him. They found a one-room apartment with a shared bath in an old Victorian house on Baker Street located about two blocks away from Golden Gate Park. They stayed there until Alvin was discharged from the Navy. Alvin had been accepted into the graduate program in Physics at California Institute of Technology. They then moved to Pasadena in Southern California. They found a house in nearby Alhambra, which they shared with an older gentleman. They had two rooms with a half bath that was outside, had kitchen privileges, and could use the shower in the other man’s section.

During that time Alice worked at Caltech for a Professor of Biochemistry to help pay for Alvin’s graduate studies. Fortunately, the government provided GI educational benefits so Alvin did not have to work and could concentrate on his studies. Alice claimed that her husband handed down a command that there should be no babies until he finished his degree. And so, it was - Alvin graduated in June of 1950, landed a job at the Physics Department, and Alice was pregnant with their first baby soon after.

They purchased a modest home in Altadena, California and soon started their family. Kristine was born January 3, 1951 and Kurt followed on December of 1953. They got a real surprise when Alice became pregnant with twins (Eric and Carl) and the family doubled in size on September 19, 1956.

With four children, it was clear the house was too small for all of them, so the living room was enlarged, and a bedroom and bathroom were added. In 1957 the entire family moved to Geneva, Switzerland. Alvin had a Fulbright Fellowship to do a year of research at the big Synchrotron at CERN Laboratory. They traveled extensively throughout Europe during that time. On the return from Switzerland it was obvious that their first house was really not big enough, so they found a much bigger house which was also in Altadena. They lived there until late 1970 when Alice and the boys moved to Santa Rosa in Northern California.

While in Southern California, Alice was very busy being a wife, mother, hostess, gardener, seamstress and all the other chores associated with the duties of running a family. She sang with a small women’s chorus for five or six years while living in Altadena. The directory said she had a clear, straight voice and wanted the other second sopranos to tune to her voice. That was the first time she heard that she had a good singing voice, which made her very proud.

Alice knew she had to find a job, but with her hearing loss many jobs were not suitable. She had always wanted to work in a hospital. In preparation, she had taken some preparatory classes at Pasadena City College so she could apply for a training program to be a medical technologist. After the move to Santa Rosa, she worked with the California Vocational Rehabilitation Organization who arranged for Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital to train her and the hospital agreed to do so on a trial basis. Reporting to the hospital, she was simply given a large book to read. Then she was slowly introduced to the rigors of being a medical technologist, starting with drawing blood (which she perpetually disliked) and then on to urinalysis, hematology, chemistry, microbiology, and blood banking. She went to Berkeley to take the State Board Exam. A few weeks after she was informed that she had passed, she was then promptly hired by the hospital, where she worked for the following fifteen years. She was a very good worker and became the moral conscience of the lab. Having a full-time job, she evolved into a respected, technical professional – confident, self-assured, not afraid to speak up when she saw things that needed to be fixed around the lab. It was a liberating experience to have her own source of money to spend.

She sang in the Sonoma County Chorus for twenty years, singing a great variety of wonderful musical works from Bach to Copeland. It was thrilling for her to sing in joint performances with the Santa Rosa Symphony and to travel to England on a choral tour.

For many years she enjoyed traveling on extended vacations with her sisters. They saw many places in the world including Russia, China, the British Isles, Scandinavia; there was also cruises to Alaska, through the Panama Canal, and along the Saint Lawrence Seaway. They also enjoyed a train trip across Canada, visits to the old South, viewing the fall colors in New England, and a humongous car trip from New Jersey to California.

She retired in 1988 and then moved to Albuquerque in 1993 where Kristine had a faculty position in public health at the University of New Mexico. Alice continued to help others as she did volunteer work in public schools to help children with their reading and assisted in the school libraries. She also volunteered in the Lovelace Hospital Library.

Certainly, one of the highlights of her later years living in Albuquerque was being a close part of Kristine’s family. She lived near Kristine’s home and a block away from Chris and Lizzie’s middle school. So, Alice was able to spend significant time watching her grandchildren grow through elementary school, middle school, high school, and college. The whole family felt fortunate that Alice was able to attend Chris’s wedding in 2015 and Lizzie’s wedding in 2019.

All who read this must realize that indeed, Alice lived a full life and left the world a better place.

A full memorial service will be held in Albuquerque when it is safe to do so. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in her name to several organizations she supported: Save the Children, Doctors without Borders, and Habitat for Humanity. Two scholarship funds will be set up at a later date at the University of New Mexico and University of Utah for those who would like to donate at a later date.