Leona Dorothy Harvey

Leona Dorothy Harvey will long be remembered for her passion for peace and justice in the Middle East. She was born on November 15, 1922 in Princeton, Minnesota to Adolph and Ina Anderson. She married Ellis Elson Harvey on January 24, 1945 in Elko, Nevada. Together they raised four children. Lynn Diane, born June 20, 1947 (married Howard Deason in 1964)., Kent Ellis born May 19, 1949, Neil Eldon born August 11, 1953 and Laurie Lee born July 7, 1957. Leona and her husband had a sugarless chewing gum factory located near the Palo Alto airport.

Leona became a member of the Palo Alto Friends Meeting by convincement on October 25, 1968. She was active in the Palo Alto Friends Meeting from the time she first started attending until she moved out of the area in 1989. She served on the Hospitality (1968, 1969), Adult Education (1970, 1971, 1977), Peace and Social Action (1970, 1971, 1983), and the Master Plan Committees (1979). The Meeting lost touch with her in her final years and we later learned that she died in 2001 or 2002.

Her passion was peace and justice for the oppressed people of the Middle East. She held at least two fundraising breakfasts in her Portola Valley home. The first was on April 13, 1975 to raise money for prostheses for Vietnamese children injured during the war. Another fundraising brunch was held on April 18, 1982 for relief of Lebanese wounded and homeless. During the later half of the 1970s and early 1980s she took up the cause for peace in the Middle East and began to educate members and attenders of the plight of the Palestinians. She invited well known speakers, initiated a letter writing campaign and sought priority of Middle East issues at Pacific Yearly Meeting in 1981.