Eminent Homemaker
County: Perkins
“I just did the job of rancher’s wife,” is the simple manner in which J. Rees Dillon explains her 30 years as a homemaker on a 1,240 acre ranch in the Bixby area of Perkins County.
In addition to her duties on the ranch, Dillon was an active member of the community—teaching rural schools in Perkins county for 10 years, serving as a 4-H Club leader, establishing and teaching Sunday school for the neighborhood youngsters and participating in the Imogene home demonstration club activities.
Dillon was born in Fulton, Illinois, on July 31, 1887, as Bertha Faye, the daughter of Martin Faye. Bertha Faye taught school in Sterling, Illinois, until her marriage. Their courtship was extended over a period of seven years as Mr. Dillon, also a native of Illinois, was homesteading in northwestern South Dakota at the time.
The Dillons were married on Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 26, 1914. Mr. Dillon brought his bride to the new, modern home he had built on his ranch. The ranch home was forty-five miles from a railroad and the building materials and furnishings were freighted in by wagon. Dillon says she was thrilled with ranch life from the first.
Dillon has one daughter, Fay Mary, who followed her mother’s footsteps as a school teacher and rancher’s wife.
This past year the Dillons retired from the ranch that Mr. Dillon had operated for 53 years.
They settled in a bungalow in Brentford where Mr. Dillon died.