Mary Dolores Tippets, 85, of Oroville, California died June 8, 2012, in Oroville, following a year of illness.

Mary was born in Sumas, Wash., June 26, 1926, the daughter of James Henry Walker and Verna Eudora (Porter) Walker; she was raised in Everson, Wash., and was a 1944 graduate of Nooksak Valley High.

Mary graduated from the US Cadet Nurse Program at St. Luke’s Hospital in Bellingham, Wash., in 1947 and upon graduating became a Registered Nurse (RN) licensed in Washington State.

She immediately began work as an RN for two physicians in Bellingham, as their office nurse and assisting them in surgery at St. Luke’s Hospital. In early 1949 Mary obtained her California RN license and began work at the University Of California Hospital in San Francisco, where she advanced to night-shift Charge Nurse in the labor and delivery unit.

In 1950 while in San Francisco Mary met Frank Tippets, and later that year they married. In 1951 the couple moved to San Luis Obispo, Calif., where Frank started training at California Polytechnic Sate College under the GI Bill to become a mechanical engineer, and Mary worked as a nurse at the French Hospital and began to have children. Upon Frank’s graduation from Cal Poly in 1954 he was hired as a new engineer by the General Electric Co. and the family of four moved to the places of Frank’s employment, initially at Richland, Wash., for two years and then back to California for Frank’s transfer to GE’s newly formed engineering headquarters at San Jose for development of commercial nuclear power plants.

Mary continued professional activity as an RN at local hospitals and skilled nursing facilities in the San Jose area, and as the operator of her own business providing in-service training to hospital staffs.

Mary retired from professional nursing in 1990 when Frank retired from General Electric and they moved to Coupeville Wash., on Whidbey Island. Mary and Frank were active members of the Northwest Island community for 13 years, and they relocated to California in 2003 to be closer to their children.

Mary loved to paint, sing, and dance, she liked and was involved in “little theater”, and she enjoyed gardening and was an expert cook.

Mary is survived by her husband Frank, son William and his wife Judy, son Michael and his wife Susan, daughter Deborah and her husband Amir, son Steven and his wife Yong, daughter Kathryn and her husband Ted, four grandchildren, two great grandchildren, and a brother Glen and his wife Yumiko.

In accordance with her expressed preference, Mary has been cremated and any memorial services will be at her gravesite. The service will be private. Arrangements are entrusted to Ramsey Funeral Home 530-534-3877.