Mary Elizabeth Thelen

Family/Spouse: William H. Dubell. William was born in 1871; died in 1950; was buried in Greenmount Cemetery, North Dansville, Livingston County, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

A funeral service was conducted Monday at the Dansville Presbyterian
Church for Frances DuBell Zerfass, 89, of 355 Second St., North
Hornell, formerly of Dansville who died Friday (July 3, 1987) at the
Steuben County Infirmary following a long illness. Burial was in
Greenmount Cemetery.
Born in Bath, Mrs. Zerfass graduated from Haverling High School and
Geneseo Normal School.
A former kindergarten teacher in the Dansville Central School
District, she instituted the district

Frances married Milton Rowe Zerfass on 29 Jun 1921 in Steuben County, New York. Milton (son of Byron Allen Zerfass and Ida May Rowe) was born in Jan 1895 in Sparta, Livingston County, New York; died in 1950 in Livingston County, New York; was buried in Greenmount Cemetery, North Dansville, Livingston County, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

DANSVILLE - Virginia Zerfass Deal passed away. She lived from Sept. 1922 - Aug. 19, 2014.

The Zerfass family landed in Pennsylvania in 1730. Traveling by covered wagon, they settled in Dansville, NY in 1830. Virginia lived on the family farm there with her mother Francis, Father Milton and sister Jackie.

Interested in science, music and doing pen and ink sketches, her parents bought her a chemistry set and a $3 microscope. After a few unplanned explosions, Virginia's experiments moved to the basement of their home on Zerfass Road.

She graduated from High School in 1939. Her last summer there was spent working in a hospital assisting with autopsies and other laboratory work.

She was accepted at Duke University with the help of a government loan for science students. While there she held a part-time job involving an analytical study for fluorine on an NDRC project. She was an Art Editor of the "Archive"
(a Duke literary magazine), president of the Pegram Chemistry Club, Staff Artist for the Zoology Dept. and was also a member of Phi Mu.

At Duke, she met her future husband, Carl Deal, who was a North Carolinian in chemistry graduate school. She was the only one in his Quant and Qual class who asked questions, he said. Married later in Duke Chapel, they both accepted jobs with Shell Development Co., the research labs for Shell Oil in the San Francisco Bay area.

The U.S. was in WWII. When Virginia went to CA to work, Carl was still in graduate school at Duke. The personnel manager of Shell, Elizabeth Ainsworth, met Ginny at the Train on Oakland. Mrs. Ainsworth became a long-time friend and was also the sister of John Steinbeck.

While at Shell, the P-Chemistry Department was making penicillin in "The High Lab" (a multi-story room for very tall distillation columns). The first thing Virginia worked on was the first pilot plant development for mass penicillin production.

Virginia was featured in the "Women at Work" section of the Petroleum Engineer Magazine in 1954. She was a California nominee for "Oil Woman of the Year" (Desk & Derick Club) and she was the first woman to give a paper before the API (American Petroleum Institute) in the West - and only the second in all of API history. The Deals would picnic in the Berkeley Hills with George Pimentel and his wife in the '40's. Carl knew Robert Oppenheimer, and was friends with Dave Packard, before his name became forever hitched to Bill Hewlett. Ansel Adams was among their acquaintances.

Virginia's career in science came at an extraordinary time in history. The post-war years carried the momentum of war-driven efforts toward peace-time objectives. The SF Bay area was the western crucible for science, with U.C. Berkley, Stanford, the Lawrence labs and a host of emerging industries. The atmosphere was positive and ambitious, and R&D efforts looked forward beyond the horizon.

Her interest in science began with a chemistry set, a microscope, and some unplanned explosions. She pursued this interest through college and launched into her career as a woman by filling the void of absent soldiers. Her first project was the penicillin pilot plant in support of those very soldiers, some of who later worked under her at Shell. Today there aren't those barriers to "women in science" which Ginny broke through long ago.

She retired in San Marcos, Tx in 1992. Virginia is survived by her daughter Julia; sons Carl, Milton and Nicholas; grandchildren Milton, Daniel, Marcus, Scottie, Haley and Parker. She was a very cool mom.

Virginia will be buried with her husband Carl in the family plot in the hillside forests of Dansville, N.Y. (GCE, August 28, 2014, pA7)

Virginia married Carl H. Deal, Jr. about 1944. Carl (son of Carl Deal and Caroline Rhodes) was born on 26 Dec 1919 in Spartanburg, Spartanburg County, South Carolina; died on 17 May 1991 in Houston, Harris County, Texas; was buried in Greenmount Cemetery, North Dansville, Livingston County, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Jackie Frances (Zerfass) Beyer, age 94, passed away on June 6, 2020 at Fairport Baptist Homes in Fairport NY. Her family thanks the staff of Fairport Baptist Homes and the entire facility for their kind, affectionate and professional care, especially during the current pandemic.

Jackie was born in her home in Dansville, NY on July 16, 1925, to Milton and Frances Zerfass. Mom grew up on the Zerfass farm that was built in 1814 along with her sister Virginia (Ginnie). She graduated from Dansville High School in 1943. Jackie then went to nursing school and planned on being a nurse but soon met the love her life Dr. Theodore (Ted) Beyer. Ted was a veterinarian, practicing in Hornell. They bought a home there, built a hospital and raised four children: Chuck, Ted Jr., Debbie, Bonnie and many dogs and cats! Jackie worked hard keeping everything running smoothly for her husband and all of her children every single day. They bought a cottage on Conesus Lake in 1957. This is where they spent summers. Jackie would cook whatever her children caught from the lake. She loved gardening, animals, and family. In turn she taught her children to love them too. The house was continuously full of animals of all sorts. Jackie was a caretaker; not only for her own mother but for her husband who became ill. Jackie continued to live on Conesus Lake until transitioning late with her daughter, Debbie and then to Fairport Baptist last year.

Jackie is survived by her sons and daughters; Charles (Bonnie) Beyer of Normandy Park, WA.; Ted (Janet) Beyer of Ridgefield, WA.; Deborah Beyer of Rochester, NY.; Bonnie (Glenn) Gotshall of Lake Leelanau MI., 8 grandchildren, Alex and Krista Beyer; Dean and Gretchen Beyer; Steven Martini; Robby, Danny, and Jamie Gotshall and 3 great grandchildren; Teddy, Wolfgang, and Maxwell.

Private interment will take place next to her husband Ted and parents Milton and Frances Zerfass at the Greenmount Cemetery, Dansville.

In lieu of flowers please make donations to the Hornell Area Humane Society, 7649 Industrial Park Rd, Hornell NY, 14843: or Lollypop Farm, 99 Victor Rd., Rochester, NY. 14450.

Family/Spouse: Doctor Theodore John Beyer. Theodore was born on 7 May 1923 in New York City, New York; died on 21 Jan 2011 in Traverse City, Grand Traverse County, Michigan; was buried in Greenmount Cemetery, North Dansville, Livingston County, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]