LAUREL – Jeanne Eleanor Ketchum Gilles, 89, a horsewoman, rancher and caregiver, died Sept. 11, 2009, at Valley Health Care Center in Billings, where she had once worked for 24 years until reaching her mid-70s.

During the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, she and her husband, Elroy Gilles, and their family were fixtures at O-Mok-Sees and rodeos throughout the area.  With her horse, George A, she won Montana and National Saddle Club Association championships in such events as cloverleaf barrel racing and pole bending. She was a member of Laurel Saddle Club and Spring Creek Riders and their state and national affiliates.

She was born June 13, 1920, in a farmhouse south of Ryegate to Margaret “Molly” Kaly and Clayton Ketchum. They farmed in the Big Coulee area near Locomotive Butte south of Ryegate. At age 7, she began school with her uncle and aunt, John and Elizabeth Wunnicke, as her teachers in one-room schools in the coulee such as 79, Pine Island, East Bench and Tacy.

She attended high school in Ryegate for three years and spent her senior year at Roberts High School. After graduating in 1939, she attended the State Normal School (now Montana State University Billings).

After graduation, she taught at rural schools in the Shawmut area (Independent) and at Gardiner and Edgar before marrying Elroy Gilles in Big Timber in 1945.

They lived on a farm north of Laurel before buying the Winters place on Spring Creek south of town in 1959 and combining it with the Gilles family holdings nearby. Mr. Gilles died in 1973.

Mrs. Gilles worked part-time at Billings Livestock Commission Co. and in the 1960s joined Valley Health Care as a nurse’s aide and later a certified nursing assistant. For many years she served as primary caregiver for her Aunt Elizabeth and later her mother-in-law, Cora Gilles, at the home south of Laurel.

After leaving employment at Valley, she raised cattle until selling the herd to the Tom and Yvonne Altman family in the 1990s. She was forced to return to the nursing home two years ago.

Survivors include sons, Jere of Columbia, Mo., Tere “T.J.” of Billings and Great Falls; Kere “Chief” of Billings; eight grandchildren; and a great-grandchild.

Services will be at 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 19, at Cremation & Funeral Gallery. Her ashes will be scattered overlooking the home place on Spring Creek.