Jeane (Wittick) Pearson
St. Paul, MN
I married a handsome, good-natured man from Madrid, Iowa , whom I met at ISU, 48 years ago. Each of us earned 3 college degrees in our first 9 years of marriage (me a Juris Doctor and him a PhD). We have 2 daughters (ages 41 and 27) , one son-in-law, and 2 grandchildren (girl 12 and boy 9).For 20 years we have lived in St. Paul, MN across the street from a 500 acre park with two lakes, bike and hike paths, and access to major bike trails. I love biking every day in good weather and watching Minnesotans enjoy the snow and ice in a variety of ways. My husband joined the St. Paul Hiking Club 2 years ago, when he retired from Land O Lakes/Purina as an animal nutritionist.
We moved around the Midwest for my husband’s career with Cenex/LandOLakes/Purina. So I earned my law license in 4 states where I practiced law (MO,IL, IA, ,MN). I enjoyed serving as a plaintiff-appellant attorney on civil rights and personal injury cases the most. I have also taught Constitutional law to law enforcement students, and I worked for an IL bank as a trust officer/investment banker for 2 years. We lived in Fort Dodge, IA for almost 20 years.
In my spare time in all the states, my favorite hobbies and past-times have been volunteer work for non-profits, like the American Association of University Women, American Business Women’s Assoc., League of Women Voters, the YWCA, and the first domestic abuse shelter in Fort Dodge that served 7 counties, and an ethnic preschool. Here in my St. Paul neighborhood, I enjoyed organizing and leading the first 4-H Club on the East Side and mentoring other adults to start 4-H clubs, and since then I served as a citizen advisor to county Extension and the state UM Extension college dean. I also loved organizing and teaching Sunday Schools and summer Bible “schools” in my current neighborhood.
In Fort Dodge, it was humbling/extremely rewarding for me to serve as YWCA President and program vp, while organizing 40 volunteers to raise a half-million dollars for capital improvements to keep our homeless shelter open, serving women and their children. When I lived in Fort Dodge during my 30’s and 40’s, I worked on ERA Campaigns and when I was on the IA state board of the League of Women Voters, I was asked to co-chair the 3rd effort to add women to the Iowa Constitution and we finally won in the late 1990’s.
My favorite BHS memories were when playing in band (jazz, concert, marching and pep). I always told our daughters the finest kids/friends you will ever meet are the creative-diligent band / music kids in any school. My favorite teachers were Mrs. Brown (who taught us Julius Caesar and about the academic essay), Mrs. Whipp ( PE teacher who encouraged fun and taught us volleyball,badminton, golf, football,etc.), Mrs. Williams (French), and Mr. Whitmore (history, who became a Boone Co. judge/commissioner). To this day, I cannot believe I ever tolerated those awful, discriminatory old rules in girls’ basketball, which prevented me from ever shooting a basket or having more than 2 dribbles past a half court or having any real fun. It took a federal law, Title IX, to bring them down and to offer college athletic scholarships to girls!!