Helen Hope (Chidester) Hunt

Dec 14, 1920 - Dec 30, 2004

My mother, Helen, was born and raised in South Bend. Along with her sister, June, they lived on Cottage Grove Avenue in a house built by her father, John and Grand-Father Frank Chidester. She attended Colfax Elementary and graduated from Central High in 1939. She was kind of a tom-boy and loved the outdoors, riding horses, canoing and swimming. She married my father (Jerome Andrew Church) in 1944..I came along in December 1944. That marrige did not last long as they were divorced before I was 3. She worked for Studebacker for around 14 years in the payroll dept. In 1952 she married her high school sweetheart, Albert Ellis Hunt.

In 1954 they left South Bend for Illinois, where their daughter Susan was born in 1955. In 1956 the family moved to San Diego, California where they purchased a home in Point Loma. Helen would spend the rest of her life in San Diego raising her two daughters. She and Al celebrated 50 years together in 2002. He died in January 2004 and is buried at Fort Rosecrans, in San Diego.

She was an active and outgoing person and always kept connections several with old high schools girlfriends. For many years she had an old truck with a camper and would head up to the local mountains, or to Shelter Island to "camp". In 1982 she became a grandmother when my son, Paul was born. In 1985 my second son, Thomas came along. She was the perfect grandmother and would spent hours teaching them about insects and nature. She was fun loving, outgoing and a killer cribbage player.

Towards the end of her life, she faced many difficult challenges, her resilience and inner strength saw her through. She was defiant until the end. I was at first disheatened when I found out she was buried in South Bend, but when I visited her at Chapel Hill, and found her mother/father/sister's graves in the same area, I knew she had "come home". She is at peace.

Source: FindAGrave.com

06/16/2025 EJS

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/58168557/helen_hope-hunt