Obituary of Minnie Margaret Shepps

Minnie Dickerson Shepps Beloved Centenarian Denville, NJ Minnie Dickerson. Shepps died peacefully on Tuesday, July 18 at her residence in Franciscan Oaks. She was born on a sunny spring day, on May 12, 1901. Her life spanned the entire 20th century and crossed well into the new millennium. She was born into a world when an oven was used as her incubator and whiskey as a cure for her case of influenza in 1918. Ironically her father told her she would never be old bones. Her parents were David Aaron Dickerson of Denville and Sarah Gilmore Dickerson from Boonton. The Dickersons are of English decent and the familys arrival in the United States can be traced back to 1638. Minnie met her hero, Clarence Shepps, at age 19 and they were married on June 14, 1924 in the Denville Methodist Church. Clarence died of cancer in 1985. They were married 61 years. She lived in her beloved Denville for the full 105 years of her life. In fact she saw the birth of the Township in 1913, her own Father among the founders. The first car came to Denville when she was a little girl, which caused family and town members great concern that she would be run over by that single car. She experienced Womens Suffrage, as her Mother, Sarah, became the first of two women to vote in Denville. Throughout her life she kept busy by doing handiwork and belonged to many clubs and organizations. As a young girl, Minnie was a member of the Campfire Girls. For many years she taught Sunday school at the Denville Methodist Church. Later she joined the Friendly Club, Junior League, the Epworth League of Denville Methodist Church, Standard Bearers of Denville-Mt. Tabor and the Kings Daughters of the Rockaway Presbyterian Church. Her father was a trustee for the Denville Cemetery Association and Minnie served with him as bookkeeper. Collecting antiques and other things has always been her favorite hobby. Up to the day she died, she enjoyed sharing stories about her childhood and Denville's history. Minnie worked as a bookkeeper for Richards in Dover from 1917 to 1918. For most of her career, she worked for The Daily Record for about 30 years; she worked side by side with the founder, Mr. Ernest Tomlinson. She held numerous positions, including proofreader in a world before spell check, movie critic before television and journalist before there was news around the clock. She retired form the Daily Record in the 1945 to care for her ailing parents. In 1996, Minnie established the David and Sarah Dickerson Memorial Scholarship fund in horror of her parents. This scholarship is awarded annually to two graduating students of Morris Knolls HS in Denville. The awards go to one boy and one girl each year. Some of the young people visited her or wrote letters of appreciation. During her century of life, Minnie experienced the excitement of running water, the telephone and the transition from gas lighting to electricity. She walked along the Morris Canal. Traveled by horse and buggy and even the Denville Trolley. Then she saw man walk on the Moon. She went from dirt roads to Interstate 80. Lived through two World Wars, Korea, Viet Nam and two wars in Iraq. She saw the Cold War from beginning and the end and 18 Presidents. You can even Google her on the Internet. As a young girl, Minnie walked all over Denville and continued to walk into town well into her nineties. Stopped only when she suffered a broken hip. Even then she persevered and was able to navigate with the use of a walker. It was a second fall, in 2000, which confined her to a wheelchair. It was important to her to live a good life. She was a child of life and now she belongs to the ages. Closest survivors include the families of Ralph and Amy VanDyk, John and Mary Anne Stanley and Cheryl and Jim Connelly, Visitation will be held Friday, July 21 from 2-4 and 7-9 pm at Norman Dean Home for Services, Denville. Funeral service will be held at Norman Dean at 10:am Saturday, July 22. Travel directions may be found by visiting www.normandean.com