Retired Clarkston businesswoman Jean Keatts shares her travel tales, tips
Life’s a journey; enjoy the trip By KATHY HEDBERG FOR GOLDEN TIMES
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fter a lifetime of travel and visiting scores of countries throughout the world, Jean Keatts of Clarkston is ready to share some of her experiences with others. The 82-year-old woman will begin her travelogues on an occasional basis in the Lewiston Tribune’s monthly Golden Times magazine (see the first one on Page 9). “I like to travel and I did most of my traveling with my younger son (Ken), who lives on the Washington coast,” Keatts said during a recent interview. “He’s been to twice as many countries as I have and I’ve been to a lot of them.” Keatts said she has traveled mainly as a tourist and has picked up some handy tips for people thinking about going out of the country. Recently she talked to a friend who wanted to take a trip but didn’t know where to go. “I said, ‘Go to Singapore. It’s the nicest place to visit. They speak English there, they’re friendly, helpful.’ ” This is the sort of information, along with suggestions of places to see and things to do while in other countries, that she hopes to share with readers. Keatts grew up on the
August Frank/Golden Times
Jean Keatts sits in her home last month with a list of all the countries she has visited. family farm in Garfield County and graduated as valedictorian of her Pomeroy High School class in 1959. Immediately after high school, Keatts married her first husband, Dave Keatts, and had three children. While raising her youngsters, Keatts also
enrolled as a student at Washington State University and completed a degree in business administration. In 1968, she opened her tax returns and accounting business and ran that for 50 years before retiring in 2008. Keatts’ first marriage ended in divorce, as well as a second mar-
riage, which, she says, was a worse disaster than the first. Currently she’s been keeping company with Bob Williams, a long time educator and superintendent in Northwest schools. Keatts said she and Williams live separately, but enjoy going places together, watching concerts and plays.
At the time of this interview, Keatts was busy working on her first installment for Golden Times and expresssed excitement to see it in print. But the writing, she admits, is “going slowly. I’m still working at it.” Hedberg may be contacted at khedberg@lmtribune.com.
“I said, ‘Go to Singapore. It’s the nicest place to visit. They speak English there, they’re friendly, helpful.’ ” JEAN KEATTS, SHARING ADVICE SHE GAVE TO A FRIEND WHO WAS LOOKING FOR A NEW PLACE TO VISIT
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