Helen McCuish Oltman, 105, of Kalona, formerly of Newton and Riley, Kansas, died peacefully at Pleasantview Home on Tuesday, April 28, 2009. The oldest of three children, Helen Katherine McCuish was born in 1905 in Leadville, Colorado. Her father, a Scotsman from Nova Scotia, was a Presbyterian Minister and her mother, of English ancestry, was a teacher in a girl's school in Utah. When Helen was 12, both her parents died, and her Aunt Katherine from Boston came to raise the three McCuish children in Newton, Kansas.
Helen met her husband Ted at Park College, Missouri,, but they delayed marriage plans until finishing their professional training. They were married in 1927 after Helen's graduation from nursing school and Ted's last year of medical school. In 1930, after the birth of their first daughter, Peggy, they traveled to Amoy (now Xiamen) China as medical missionaries for the Reformed Churches of America.
In 1941, Helen and the three children returned to Newton, KS, where Ted joined them after being released from Japanese prisoner of war status for 10 months. After World War II, Helen and Ted returned to China to continue medical work until Communist Chinese officials expelled them in 1950. They then set up a rural medical practice in Riley, KS until 1989, when Helen moved to Kalona.
Helen was an active member of the Riley Presbyterian Church, the Riley Chapter of the County Extension Home Education unit, a Neighborhood Club, P.E.O., a Great Books Discussion Group, United Presbyterian Women and served as office nurse and bookkeeper for her husband's medical practice. She also organized volunteer activities for the Leonardville Nursing Home and helped serve congregate meals in Riley.
Helen was preceded in death by her husband, Ted Oltman, two sons, Robert and John, her brother and sister: John McCuish and Anna Margaret McCuish and one grandson, Mark T. Cook.
Helen is survived by two daughters, Margaret (Peggy) Bailey of Rochester, MN, and Katherine and husband Robert Cook of rural Riverside, IA, five grandchildren: Kathie Bailey of Minneapolis, MN, Ellen and husband Geoffrey Warner of Rochester, MN, Douglas and wife Teresa Cook of New Madison, OH, Lisa and husband Alec Scranton of Coralville, IA and Beatrice Boltz of Iowa City, IA and six great-grandchildren, Sarah Warner, Gregg, Audrey and Elizabeth Scranton and Alexis and Lawson Cook.
Memorial contributions are designated for Heifer Project International, the Sharon Center United Methodist Church or Iowa City Hospice.
peterseimfuneralhome. com.

Published in the Press-Citizen on May 1, 2009
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