Sandra Jean Kelton Pitts

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

5 August 1934 - 4 April 2015

Sandy was born in Santa Barbara, Calif. Her parents separated when she was young, and she spent several years living with Catholic nuns and attending their school.

When her mother remarried, she was adopted by her stepfather, William Kelton, and moved back to Santa Barbara to rejoin her family. She finished grade school and high school in Santa Barbara and accompanied her family when they moved to El Paso, Texas.

She attended Texas Western College, now the University of Texas in El Paso, graduating in three years with a BA degree in Theatre Arts.

She and a friend, Mina Jo King, drove to New York City to pursue a career in acting. After playing some minor roles in off-Broadway plays, she realized that the directors were looking for tall, busty, blonds and not short red heads, so she accepted a teaching job in Puerto Rican Harlem. She gained a wealth of teaching experience there and decided she enjoyed its challenge.

She returned to California and taught grade school in Los Angeles while earning a Master's Degree in education and language arts from the University of Southern California.

Sandra next applied for a job in the DOD overseas teaching program. She taught officers and enlisted men's children at USAF base in Morocco, North Africa. After two years there, she was transferred to teach at a USAF base in Bitburg, Germany.

She later moved home to El Paso, Texas, where she resumed her teaching career. She and Earl Pitts, a major in the USAF, now divorced, were married in New York City on the 23rd of July 1965. She continued to teach on many of the Air Force Bases when she was authorized to accompany her husband.

On one accompanied assignment, Colonel Pitts was the Commander of the Technical Assistance Fields Teams in Iran. These were teams of select USAF technicians sent to Iran to teach their Iranian counterparts to maintain the F-4E and F-5E aircraft that the Shah had purchased from the U.S.

Sandy remained in Teheran while her husband flew an Imperial Iranian Air Force F-5 to each down country IIAFB to liaise between the wing commanders and his TAF teams. The revolution to overthrow Shah Pahlavi finally reached such intensity that a hectic withdrawal of US forces was begun.

Sandy later wrote a book describing this unhappy episode in their lives. It was published as "Boars, Bazaars, and Bugging Out."

Colonel Earl Pitts retired from the service after 34 years of active duty. He retired at Kirtland AFB at Albuquerque, New Mexico and resumed his civilian occupation as a flight instructor for the Kirtland Aero Club.

Sandy was now the Director of Teacher Education at the University of Albuquerque. While teaching there, she completed her Doctorate degree at the University of New Mexico.

After 18 years in Albuquerque, they moved to Mountain Home, Idaho, to be nearer their kids. Her last teaching job was as Adjunct Professor for Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University teaching Masters students.

Sandy was preceded in death by her mother and father. She is survived by her husband Earl; her daughters, Candace Jayne (Tim) Carstensen, Cindy Lou (Terry) Lindquist and Carrie Anne (Don) Grant; her grandchildren, Brook (Brian) Weeks, Jennifer (Kim) Malar-Currie, Justin (Jessica) Currie, Steven (Heather) Lindquist, Nicholas and Christopher Grant, and Tim, Richard and Willy Carstensen; her great grand children, Zachary and Madison Weeks, and Paige Georgia Currie. She is also survived by her brothers, David and Fletcher Kelton.

A "Celebration of Life" for Sandy will be held from 2 to 4 p.m. on June 6 at the First Congregational United Church on North 15th East Street between North 3rd East and North 6th East. In lieu of flowers, Sandy would wish contributions be made to the Mountain Home Arts Council.