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Candace Fowler Griffey (Chelf), born on July 27, 1947, in Iowa City, Iowa, peacefully passed away on December 28, 2023, during a Christmas celebration with family in Western Springs.
She is survived by her brother, Gary, sons Mike (Kristin) and Shea (Courtney) and grandchildren Alex (Ben), Shea (Daylon), Garrett, Macy (Cole), Josh, Jackson, Drew, and JD; and great grandchildren Liam and Aria. Candace leaves behind a legacy of love and cherished memories.
Candace was an amazing bridge instructor and a Grand Life Master in competitive bridge, achieving a national championship and securing second place in a world championship among many other accomplishments. Her passion for the game brought joy to those who shared the table with her. Beyond cards, Candace found delight in exploring the world, having traveled to Europe and Japan with friends, eagerly anticipating upcoming trips to South America/Antarctica and Western Europe.
A devoted sports enthusiast, she ardently supported the University of Iowa and cheered on her grandkids' high school sports. Her schedule was always planned around her sports! Her spirit and enthusiasm will be deeply missed.
Candace had recently moved into the Harmony Reserve community in Vero Beach and was living her best life. Candace was extremely happy making friends, taking part in exercise classes, and creating memories.
A celebration of Candace's life will take place at the Vero Beach Bridge Club on Sunday, March 3rd, where friends and family will gather to remember the remarkable woman who touched so many lives.
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Connie Beaver (Throckmorton)
Will Maas
IN MEMORIAM
SMILE BECAUSE IT HAPPENED
CANDY CHELF GRIFFEY
July 27, 1947-December 28, 2023
“Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” – Dr. Seuss
Candy Chelf Griffey, left, with Margaret Cretzmeyer & Ginger Kornegor Schapira.
Iowa City High School Class of 1965 Reunion. September 13, 2023.
YOUR LAST NIGHT ON THIS EARTH
You disappeared in the dead of winter, on a dark cold night in Western Springs, Illinois. On the evening of December 28, 2023, the thermometer sank in the mouth of the dying day to 34 degrees. But it felt colder. More like 28.
Cloudy skies drizzled on treetops and rooftops. But you were warm and safe and dry on a couch with your son Shea’s family celebrating Christmas. Oh how you loved your two sons, Mike and Shea, and their wives and your grandchildren and great grandchildren!
You were that woman whose beaming smile lit up a room when she walked in. Still glowing in the aftermath of last September’s Class Reunion, you reached out to your old friend Connie Beaver Throckmorton. You were sending out Facebook friend requests to other class members.
Your son Shea, an Iowa Football season ticket holder, was sending tickets for your other son Mike and you to attend the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, Florida. You were psyched to see the Hawkeyes take on Tennessee, just four days away, on January 1, 2024.
Candy, in your days on this planet, you got around! Having traveled already to Europe and Japan, you dreamed of new journeys: vorages to Western Europe, South America, and Antarctica!
In the middle of the chaos of your happily human life, your heart suddenly stopped. They sped you to a hospital a block away. They tried to revive you.
SWEET MEMORIES OF YOU
Memories, pressed between the pages of my mind
Memories, sweetened through the ages just like wine
Quiet thoughts come floating down and settle softly to the ground
Like golden autumn leaves around my feet
I touched them and they burst apart with sweet memories…
Memories” by Ash Howes, Richard Stannard, Iain James & Brad Ellis
On July 20, 2023, in a naked attempt to lure you into coming to our final class reunion in September, I wrote you an email with two photos attached.
1985. ICHS Class of 1965 20th Reunion. It looks like we’d just been indicted and The National Enquirer showed up.
The same reunion, different night. Next to Jan Davis. You're sort of fake-smiling? Maybe annoyed that I caught you fiddling with your earring?
I opened with:
Dear Candy:
My first memory of you may be mistaken. In grade school I vaguely recall Cynthia Suter and you mopping up your competition in the Iowa City Recreation League Table Tennis Tournament. You murdered my sister Beth and me in Ping Pong. I'm not sure that we scored any points against you two professionals.
My first wife Cynthia (Suter) Maas remembers that you got a ping pong table, and though you were a left-handed swinger, you mastered the game in short order. Cynthia has athletic genes, but she was no match for you.
I went on in this email to you:
My second memory is meeting you in our 7-12 homeroom and liking you. You and Bruce Schwab were the first two people to be nice to me in junior high.
Then there was the 8th grade typing class taught by Clifford Walters. Mr. Walters was on the short side, stooped over, balding. He perched thick, black-rimmed glasses on his beak-like nose.
When I first met him, I thought, Barn owl.
He warned our class, "I’m sorry, but I can’t pass you unless you can type 40 words a minute by the end of this semester." During oral dictation exercises Mr. Walters stumbled on one word, repeatedly, "Okay, boys and girls, now we are going to begin typing set-ness-es!"
On the final exam I eked out 40 words per minute. I recall you effortlessly rapping out 95-100 w.p.m. Is that right? I think you got faster with time and may have broken 100 many times after that class.
When you were later introduced to the IBM Selectric Typewriters, with their revolving golf ball elements, I bet your word count shot up into the stratosphere.
This one high school memory of you is the most poignant. It was in the spring of our sophomore year at City High in a Biology Class taught by Dr. Richard Rush.
Me at 16.
I was pathologically shy. Pathetically unsocialized. For the past four summers, while other boys were learning new dances and hanging out with girls in bikinis at the Iowa City Swimming Pool, I was sweating away my childhood. Laboring in the heat at a turkey ranch in West Liberty, and later at three farms scattered across two counties. While other guys were talking to and flirting with girls, I was slinging turkey poop with a pitchfork, whacking down roadside weeds with a sythe under a sweltering sun, and stacking bales in musty hay mows.
I first met Cynthia Suter in tenth grade biology class at City High taught by Dr. Richard Rush. Through my teenaged eyes he looked like a diminutive, red-headed, bow-tie sporting, tight-ass Ph.D. He was like a wall-eyed pike, bred for running white rapids in the Canadian Rockies, now condemned to paddle around in this little pond of a public high school.
We were seated at two-person desks. I, who had no friends, sat alone. Cynthia Suter and you giggled and fired secret notes around the class.
Cynthia Suter as a sophomore.
When Dr. Rush dimmed the the lights for a science movie, I glanced back at you two. The eight millimeter projector chattered. A nasal-drone announcer intoned, “Boys and girls, welcome to today’s film, Fauna and Flora of the Middle Western States." Dr. Rush, apparently finding our biology movies a notch or four below his educational ledge, quietly slipped out the door while the films were playing, so he could sneak a smoke in the teacher’s lounge.
That was a mistake.
Cynthia and you shoved wads of notebook paper into your mouths, soaked them thoroughly, then fired your spitwads at the back of Drew Appleby’s head. Gawd. You girls could pitch! Appleby, a skinny kid with freckles and brown-rimmed glasses whirled around, scanning the back of the room.
Soon, Drew was soaking down his own spitballs. The battle of the flying spittles was on!
You and Cynthia were so naughty. I’d look fleetingly and disapprovingly at you ladies. And then quickly turn away so you’d not catch me looking.
Finally, your misbehavior ratcheted up and snatched both of you by the neck.One afternoon, Dr. Rush stood glaring down at Cynthia and you, his eyes racing across the apparently empty pages of your notebooks.
He growled, “You girls haven’t filled out your science notebooks!”
It started with Cynthia and spread to Candy: shaking and crying.Heavy tears rolling down your cheeks.I got mad.I thought Dr. Rush was bullying you and making you cry.Cynthia later told me your were both laughing so hard you were crying.
Not a speck remorse in you two miscreants.
Dr. Rush snapped, “You girls are not going to sit together anymore!Cynthia—find another desk mate!”
Cynthia rose from her chair.She scanned the room, like a hawk searching for a juicy field mouse.Her green eyes lit on me.I’m sure I was blushing.When I put my head down on my desk to hide out, she announced, pointing at me, “I”ll take him.” She later told me she was looking for the shyest boy in the room and saw me put my head down.
I closed my 2023 email to you:
But for your misbehavior, I’d never have dated Cynthia. My children and grandchildren would never have appeared, Candy! My family thanks you for acting up.
Every time I’ve seen you since high school it looks like you’ve been sipping Ponce De Leon’s fountain of youth.
I would love to see you come to what Ed Etheredge called our "Last Picture Show" this September. I imagine you've got lots of stories to tell.
Warmly,
Will Maas
HOW WE REMEMBER YOU
On this 8th day of January, 2024, in the New Year you did not live to see, we are gathering our stories about you, like sheaves of oats during harvest time in Iowa. We’ll spread those oat seeds in the winds of a website, which who knows, may be our only legacy to survive in the uncertain centuries to come.
Candy, I can’t help crying that your life is over. But I can go on smiling that your life happened!
Rest in Peace, kind soul!
Love, Will
P.S. I'll always remember you in our "Last Picture Show" group photo taken on September 13, 2023, at the Big Grove Brewery as the young woman in blue, standing right behind Earl Lockhart in his wheelchair. You were a lovely classmate, and a fine friend.
Will Maas
For those who may wish to send sympathy cards or letters to Candy's family, here is the address for her younger son, Shea Fowler. He will pass along your messages to his family.
Shea Fowler
4521 Johnson Avenue
Western Springs, Illinois 60558