Susan McKeehan

Susan (“Susie”) McKeehan, 86, born in Norman, Oklahoma, on December 23, 1939, the eldest child of Edna and James McKeehan, died on January 31, 2026, in Seattle, Washington after a brief illness.

Susie began her life living with her parents in Norman, Oklahoma while her parents attended graduate school at the University of Oklahoma.  In 1942, the family moved to Mount Vernon, Washington where her father taught high school classes in Anacortes, and she attended Lincoln Elementary School.  In 1952 the family moved to Kirkland, Washington for her father’s next teaching assignment and Susie attended Lake Washington High School taking mathematics and history classes from her father and from her future husband Norman H. Clark.  Upon graduation from Lake Washington, she attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon where she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in history in 1962.

In November of 1962 Susie volunteered and entered Peace Corps training as one of 50 trainees for an eventual assignment as an English teacher in Sakon Nakhon, Thailand.  She returned to the United States in 1964 to reside in Portland, Oregon and pursue work as a teacher, and eventually as the Director of the Portland Adult Literacy Project leading 500 volunteers tutoring 700 adults across the city.  In 1971 Susie was awarded a master’s degree in social work from Portland State University where she also served as an intern at the Multnomah County Mental Health Clinic in Portland, Oregon.  She had numerous progressive assignments throughout her career as a social worker including her first position with the State School for the Blind in Vancouver, Washington that solidified her desire to work serving others.  In 1974, she accepted a leadership position as the Director of Adult Programs at the Rainier School in Buckley, Washington supporting special needs individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and later a position as Superintendent of Lakeland Village in Medical Lake, Washington.  She completed her psychiatric social work career as Superintendent at the Hissom Memorial Center in Sand Springs, Oklahoma until her retirement in 1989.

On May 9, 1991, Susie married Norman H. Clark a long-time family friend and crush, former teacher of hers in high school, and fellow commercial salmon fisherman with her father.  Living in Tumwater, Washington she enjoyed reading, investing in the stock market, gardening, and volunteering for local events with the Washington State Democratic Party.  She joined her husband as they were determined to enter the commercial fishing business, living in La Push, Washington and fishing offshore in their twenty-foot sea-going dory for six months each year.  They both enjoyed reading sentences from numerous historical and political journals out loud to each other while sharing the rainy summer days (La Push is in the rain forest).  During their time in La Push, they researched and drafted a book about the Quileute Indians, and published an Oral History on a respected Washington Supreme Court Justice.  They also hosted numerous family reunions with the McKeehan clan and shared many walks on First and Second Beaches.  Susie and Norman moved to La Conner, Washington in 1998 where they bought a small boat to go crab fishing, and they remained married until his death in February 2004.

In her later years, Susie traveled to Russia and Australia and numerous trips to and from her family.  She hosted writing groups, wrote her memoires, published her own book, Runaway in the Treehouse, in 2022, and started a local paper in La Conner on community activities and local news.  She was active in her La Conner community, hosting meditation, training in the martial art of Soo Bahk Do, writing, and conducting exercise groups.  After moving to Bothell and eventually Lynnwood, Washington she stayed close to her sisters and many nieces and nephews and their families, surrounded by love with many wonderful trips to La Conner, La Push, Portland, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.  Susie was a parental figure to the entire McKeehan family through the years, and was often host to her many nieces and nephews throughout her life and all of theirs, providing a deep library of science fiction books, inspiring them with her free spirit, generous ways, kindness and fairness, and spoiling them all with whatever they wanted to eat and do.

Susie was preceded in death by her parents, Edna and James McKeehan; husband Norman H. Clark; brothers P. Michael McKeehan and Bill McKeehan; sister-in-law Judy McKeehan; and brother-in-law Khozem Hakim.  She is remembered by her stepson Kenneth (Sheila) Clark of Leesburg, Virginia; sisters Katie McKeehan of Cheney, Washington and Sara (Glen) Rognstad of Poulsbo, Washington; caregiving nieces Cindy (Christopher) Bartlett, Alefiya (Chris) Deards, and Katija (Matt) Waldrop; and numerous nephews and nieces and their families.  Rest now Susie, you lived a wonderful life.  Thank you for touching and helping enrich the lives of so many people around the world.

Private family memorial and burial services are planned for this summer in La Push, Washington.  Memorials may be given to the Peace Corps Partnership Program in honor of the Volunteers who lost their lives during service (www.peacecorps.gov/donate/)