Abbie Lenore (Skinner) Wagner

Abbie Lenore (Skinner) Wagner was born on April 2, 1929, in Cushing, Oklahoma, to Mike Thurman and Ruth Isabel (Mullinix) Skinner. She passed away in her home in Wheatland Village on May 31, 2025, at the age of 97. From a young age, she told everyone to call her “Lenore,” and she’d be highly offended if we stopped now. So, Lenore was the 4th of eight children, three boys and five girls, and life was hard in the Midwest during the Depression. They ate what they could grow, and her mother made dresses for the girls out of flour sacks. Lenore was educated in a one-room schoolhouse, and it was during those years that she developed a passion for reading. She read every book in the small library several times, including all twenty encyclopedias. Her love of reading lasted the rest of her life—whenever her finances improved, so did the number of books on her bookshelf.

In 1942, when Lenore was 15, her parents moved to the Walla Walla Valley to give their children a chance for a better education. She attended Yakima Valley Academy for one year and finished her secondary education at Walla Walla College Academy in 1947. She worked as a nurse’s aide at Walla Walla General Hospital and also at the Walla Walla Cannery for the next two years to have enough money for college. Love, however, postponed her educational plans. Lenore married Dell Wagner, the handsome son of German immigrants and her high school sweetheart, on July 3, 1949. When their daughters were in high school, Lenore went back to school and received her nursing degree from Columbia Basin College in 1969. Lenore worked as a nurse for 13 years. In 1961, she and Dell purchased what was then known as the “county poor farm” and converted it into a dairy farm. After several years of running a dairy and then growing zucchini and cucumbers for the cannery, they went into an entirely new direction and built Country Estates Mobile Home Park in 1974. Dell and Lenore sold Country Estates in the 1990s and enjoyed the fruits of their labor. They’d always wanted to travel, and in retirement, they visited 27 different countries. In many of those countries, they helped build churches, schools, and medical facilities. Lenore was a life-long member of the Seventh-day Adventist City Church and especially enjoyed volunteering for their Community Services program.

She is survived by her daughters, Janalee Coffeen (Nat), Gail Wagner, and Julie Wade (Gary); two sisters, Lee Peterson (John) and Marilyn Stanford; and three sisters-in-law: Betsy White (Wendell), Phyllis Wagner, Judy Skinner; one brother-in-law, Richard Wagner; and numerous nieces and nephews. She also has five grandchildren and ten great-grandchildren. Lenore was scrappy, stubborn, forthright (you never had to guess what she was thinking), and generous. Those who knew her will never forget her.

Memorial donations can be made to the Wanda Skinner Gross Student Aid Fund at Walla Walla Valley Academy or through Walla Walla Community Hospice. (Wanda, Lenore’s youngest sister, died 40 years ago to the day of Lenore’s passing) through the Herring Groseclose Funeral Home, 315 W Alder St, Walla Walla, WA 99362. Friends and family are invited to sign the online guestbook at www.herringgroseclose.com.