Remembering our roots ~ Dorothy Hood
John Godsman
Times Contributor
Little is known of the grandparents on her dad’s side, but her grandfather on her mother’s side was Herman Tatz, a well-known (GP) doctor in Ger-many in the 1900’s. He was smuggled out of Germany in a trunk, during WW1 and moved to America.
Dorothy’s Dad Gustav Adolf was born in Hollywood, Minn. on Sept. 11, 1895 the second youngest of six children. Her Mum Lydia Bertha was born in St. Paul, Minn. May 19, 1900. A point of interest – on the 19th of May, 1919 she celebrated her 19th birthday! Gustav and Lydia were married in Langenburg, Sask. in 1921. Gustav worked for Canadian National Railway.
Dorothy was born in Gerald, Sask. on Aug. 27, 1933 – where she went to school for Grade 1. As there were no other Grade 2 students except her, they placed her in a Grade 3 class, and she stayed at Gerald School through Grade 8. She took Grade 9 as a correspondence course, then car pooled seven miles to the Village of Spyhill, for Grade 10, before returning to Gerald School for Grades 11 and 12.
This meant she was only 16 years of age when she graduated. Her first choice for work after graduation was to enter nursing, but she found out that she was two years too young. So, as there was a big shortage of teachers in Saskatchewan in those days, she became a study supervisor at Grayson Country School, with a class of 32 students, where two of the stu-dents were 16 years old, the same age as her!
Finally in 1952, at the age of 19 years, she was enrolled at Teaching College in Moose Jaw, where according to Dorothy she had a wonderful time. Whilst studying here, she met Verna Hood who took her to her family’s home in Raymore, Sask. for a weekend. Here she met her future husband – Thomas Hood, who was a farmer. His forefathers were Quakers who moved from Holland to Indiana, then Saskatchewan. Their original surname was was ‘Houdt’ but they changed it to ‘Hood’ on arriving in America. Tom was born Sept. 8, 1931 in Raymore, Sask. the second youngest of 11 children. Tom and Dorothy were married in Gerald, Sask. on July 9,1955 and they had four children in six years. Dorothy continued teaching throughout all four pregnancies. They now have five grandchildren and a great-grandchild is due in early May.
Tom left farming in 1958 and joined Federated Co-op in Saskatchewan, then moved the family to Calgary in 1962, where he joined Calgary Co-op. Dorothy completed her education by taking night classes, received her teaching degree, majoring in Special Ed, then taught special needs students for the next 29 years, working with Dr. Carl Saffron, who was the superintendent of the public school board in Calgary. She taught all levels of special needs as a teacher, resource teacher and ended up being a learning resource teacher, which involved testing students, as well as setting up programs for other teachers to use.
At the age of 59 years (1992), Dorothy had to retire to look after Tom who was suffering from COPD and Diabetes. They moved to Strathmore in 1996, and Tom passed away in 2006. A year later, Dorothy became a volunteer at Strathmore Hospital where she still works today. She also serves on the Lutheran Church Council, and since 1996, has been a member of The Happy Gang, where she has served in most executive positions. For three years, she ran the weekly Friday crib games, and since 2011 has or-ganized crib tournaments. In early 2015, she was asked to arrange a crib tournament for the Alberta 55 Plus Games held in Strathmore July 16-19, 2015. Unfortunately, she had a heart attack on July 9, which as she said, took precedence!
Since arriving here in 1996, she stated the growth in population appears to have affected the warmth of residents. Town planning isn’t that good because there’s no main street. However, she maintains that Strathmore is the only place to live, and supports local businesses by completing all her shopping in town.
Dorothy’s main goal in life was to help one person, and any others were bonuses. God would have had it no other way, as he was on her side.