Doris Randall

Doris Randall was born in Walla Walla, WA to parents John and Beatrice (Cowart) Reihl on February 21, 1928, and passed away at her Lake Samish home on August 29, 2024, where she was surrounded by her family.

While a student at Jefferson Elementary School in Walla Walla, Doris had the same first grade teacher that her father had, Miss Rose Lucinger. She attended Walla Walla High School, where she lettered in Blue Devil sports and graduated in 1945. Doris went on to Eastern Washington University and attended school year-round so that she could graduate in three years.

At Eastern, Doris met fellow student Charles “Chuck” Ross Randall Jr. Chuck’s favorite story was the time he told a professor that he had a date with the prettiest girl in school, and when the professor asked who it was, Chuck replied Doris Reihl, to which the professor answered, “I don’t know if she is the prettiest, but she certainly is the smartest.” Chuck and Doris married after graduation and honeymooned in Canada using their friend Sandy Sinclair’s pink polka dot Jeep.

After college, Doris taught fifth grade at Opportunity Grade School in Spokane until 1955, then went on to teach Home Economics in Republic, WA, before substitute teaching in the Freeman School District. While living in Lind, WA, from 1958 to 1961, Doris taught one-on-one Special Education for the Pasco School District. In 1962, she began substituting in the Burlington Edison School District, which segued into a full-time fifth grade position that she held until 1970.

In 1968, Doris took a couple memorable trips. She and Chuck chaperoned Bellingham and Sehome High Schools’ boys’ basketball team in Europe, and in another memorable trip that year, Doris—the only woman in the group—took Western’s men’s basketball players to exhibition games in Taiwan, Australia, Singapore, and the Philippines through the People to People program.

During Chuck’s sabbatical in 1976, Doris, Chuck, and John drove from Bellingham to the Panama Canal. On the way, they stopped in Guatemala for two weeks to help restore homes in the hills after the earthquake. From Panama they traveled by train through Colombia, where they visited a friend, Sharon McKie, before traveling on to Miami then returning home via a 30-day bus trip to see the US. After Chuck’s retirement from Western in the ‘70s, they took students on study abroad trips to Morelia, Mexico, for eight years in the fall and spring quarters.

Doris’s favorite place in the world was her garden. She loved flowers. She worked picking daffodils, not for the money, but because the farmers didn’t want the opened flowers. She brought armfuls of daffodils home, sent flowers to her children’s teachers and to her beloved Garden Street Methodist Church where they covered the altar. She belonged to a garden group and launched many a new garden for friends with starts from her own garden.

One of her dear friends, Rae Esperson, taught her to make dried and pressed flower notecards. Doris continued making cards up until just a few weeks before she passed.

A lifelong reader with a large book collection, Doris was in book clubs over the years and vigorously used the bookmobile, taking home a bag of books every week.

Doris was also an amazing seamstress and made beautifully tailored clothes and bridesmaids’ gowns. She could tat, crochet, and knit. Up until the pandemic, she met with her fellow quilters weekly for years. She enjoyed her comrades of the needle so much. Many of her loved ones have enjoyed her lace, quilts, throws, sweaters, and hats.

One of her pride and joys was the Christmas ornaments that she and her fellow United Methodist Women made for the annual Christmas tree, and their ornaments still adorn Garden Street’s tree every year.

Doris was preceded in death by her husband, Charles “Chuck” Randall (1926-2016); son, John Randall (1959-2016); and brothers, Joseph Riehl (1926-1941) and Ron Riehl (1936-2008).

She is survived by her daughter, Jennifer Randall; son, Jeff Randall (Hideko Todoroki); granddaughter, Novella Randall; sister, Lucy Duchemin; brother, Leonard (Grace) Reihl; sister in-law, Helen Reihl; and many beloved nieces and nephews.

In lieu of flowers, gifts in her memory can be made to Garden Street United Methodist Church.

An open house celebrating Doris’s life will be held 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. on Saturday, September 14th at Jennifer’s house on Lake Samish, 2094 Firelane Rd. Bellingham, WA.