With heavy heart we share the following message:
Clifton Door’s long-time neighbor and friend Gene died Wednesday of COVID-19. He had been in Canyon Lakes Rehab recovering from a stroke. Gene and Clifton’s husband were friends for more than 50 years and Gene has taken care of Clifton since her husband passed away. This is a huge blow for Clifton. They did not tell Gene’s family he had been exposed at Canyon Lakes and sent him home. Clifton visited him last week to welcome him home. She is now in quarantine for 14 days. As many of you know, Clifton has been having health challenges prior to being exposed to COVID 19. Positive energy, prayers and support are needed for Clifton!
We ask Desert Fiber Members flood Clifton with positive thoughts, phone calls, written notes, emails and virtual hugs. Desert Fiber Arts will be sending Clifton flowers for a visual reminder that her Desert Fiber Family is with her in our thoughts and prayers.
- 2002 S. Cedar St.
- Kennewick, WA 99337
- 509-585-2448
- cd***@li**.com
Clifton Door – a self-reliant person
Casually Clifton talks about building her own loom, her second floor loom that is. It is fun for her to figure out how they are built – she likes the technology. Her construction confidence came from building things alongside her Dad. For example when her father, Clifford Rasch, became the Kennewick Vista
Field Airport manager in 1953 she helped her Dad build hangars at the age of 13.
Clifton was born in Seattle and came here when she was 9 and 10 while her family decided whether to move here permanently as her father’s housing construction involvement grew. Before long he supervised the construction of the Wanapum Dam visitor’s center, Columbia High School and grade schools in Richland and the first school in Mesa.
After Clifton and her husband had children (twins and another child all under the age of 2 ½), they built their house in 1964. She had always been around her Dad so helping to build her own house was not a problem. All three kids slept in a playpen while she worked on the one story 1300 square foot house. It seemed huge after living in an 800 sq. ft. house! She got married at the age of 17.
During her life she has learned that if she needed something she could make it. When she was three years old she stood at a treadle sewing machine learning to sew straight seams on clothing. She was never bored growing up. Her mother always found something for her to do. At 5 years old Clifton knitted her first scarf. The first weaving she saw was in Seattle. It was a Dirndl style skirt with a wide border. It has always fascinated Clifton what you could do with thread and turn it into some weaving!
Her friendship with Edith Marsh, another charter member, was a treasure. Clifton and Edith’s daughter went to school together so she knew Edith for many years. Edith’s husband and Clifton’s husband were school bus drivers and at age 19 Clifton became one of 3 women bus drivers. After delivering the kids to schools, the bus drivers and their wives would hang around the bus garage to visit. Edith would bring Ray his lunch and show what she was working on. Since both Clifton and Edith sewed they had something in common and the friendship grew. Edith loaned her a Dorothy 4 harness table loom.
Clifton’s first weaving on the borrowed loom was a foot stool cover. She watched Edith weave a lot and that is how she learned. Since she had fun experimenting with Edith’s loom, Clifton’s Dad built her a 42” four harness table loom. Using Speed Cro-sheen thread she made the heddles. In 1969 Clifton got an Ashford spinning wheel for $35 as a kit. When Edith could get a group order together she’d order them for everyone from New Zealand.
By 1972, Edith and her fiber friends in the old part of Kennewick were getting together often. When Desert Fiber Arts was formally formed in 1974 they all became charter members including Clifton. Everyone in the guild went to each other’s homes to learn whatever that person was good at. Everyone
who had something to teach taught the others. The members would go out collecting as a group from spring to summer into fall. They’d collect sage or some flower by the river. They’d all go and pick a handful. Judy Green kept records and did it scientifically: how many lbs. etc., and wrote a book “Natural
dyes from Northwest plants”. Clifton liked the lichen dye results best. The DFA guild bought a mimeograph machine when Clifton became newsletter editor as there wasn’t time to go down to the print shop with 3 kids. It wasn’t printed every month because of the cost.
With the intentions of being a school teacher she graduated from CBC and attended the University in Ellensburg in the mid 1970’s but she soon realized that she was making almost as much as a teacher by driving the school bus. And at the end of 8 hours she was done for the day! Her goals in life were not to be rich but to do things with her kids and time to do her hobbies. Clifton was indeed busy with her kids – horse shows, trail riding and family camping.
All the clothes for herself and the kids and shirts for her husband were sewn by her. Clifton also did a little quilting and taught at Sandy’s Fabrics in Kennewick. She taught the women bus drivers how to knit. Recently she saw one of those bus drivers and the driver told her that she has knitted ever since. Speaking with Clifton at the Benton Franklin Fair was a fitting background for Clifton to reminisce over her connection with fairs. Way back when Benton City had a fair she and her parents were involved there. Her Dad was on that fair board and her Mom was a department superintendent. Clifton was a judge of the Home Economics area. Then came the Benton Franklin County Fair and her Dad was on this Board until her parents moved away in 1980. Her Dad and others had built new bathrooms and gradually the Fair buildings were built. Everyone donated supplies and their labor. Her Mom had been the hand weaving superintendent. During those and continuing years Clifton was also involved. She received a badge in recognition of 20 years of service. Edith came often to spin. When it is a decision to weave, she weaves something to use at home. Next comes choosing the pattern. She loves the Margarite Davison book because you can do so many designs with one threading. The last is color.
Clifton says “Any minute that I waste will never be replaced.” That doesn’t mean she doesn’t sit down and catch her breath. She gets a good night’s sleep and gets up at day break. When she wakes up in the morning, her brain goes 100 mph – she is ready to go. Clifton rejoined DFA during the Fair in 2010. She discovered there were still people she knew and she has had the best of times reconnecting.
By Chris Simonen
