Esther Borte, right, poses for a photograh at a recent band concert where she was watching her great-grandchildren perform. She is with daughter Mary Blair, center, and granddaughter Tammy, right.
Esther Borte spent a quarter century teaching 4-H youngsters to sew, and the same length of time teaching seniors to quilt.
The Toledo native’s sewing skills will be showcased this weekend during the 94th annual Toledo Cheese Days when someone wins a green and gold Rose Garden quilt. They’ll also be visible in aprons worn by the crew serving breakfast at the senior center from 7 to 11 a.m.
The second Saturday of every month, the 86-year-old volunteer crosses the street at 4 a.m. to fix biscuits with sausage gravy, assisted by a faithful crew that arrive two hours later to prepare and serve breakfast of pancakes, eggs, and ham or sausage.
Last Cheese Days, the center served breakfast to 400 people before running out of food. This year, Borte bought enough victuals for 500, but attendees should drop in early — just in case.
She is descended from early Toledo pioneers and married a man whose great-great-grandfather was the first white man to settle in the region — Simon Plamondon.
Borte’s mother, Edna, was born in 1903 to John and Etta (Bowen) Knab. In the early 1880s, Knab settled near Cedar Creek, and a school and post office both were named after the family, which included Frank, Daisy, Ira, Edna, Leroy, Grace and Olive. Edna weighed just over a pound at birth; her mother’s wedding ring fit on her arm. Her twin brother survived only a few days.
Borte’s father, Edwin Calista, was born in 1899 in Wisconsin, but his parents divorced when he was 5, so his mother, Emile, worked in Montana logging camps to provide for her five children: Anna, Jess, Edwin, Bill and Ted. After she married Swiss native Karl Wittwer, they moved to a Winlock farm.
Edwin and Edna Calista met at a Drew’s Prairie dance hall, married in 1923, and had 15 children: Joy, John, Esther, Kenneth, Francis, Lillian, Ray, Bob, Dyche, Mary, David, Jim, Josephine, Betty and Art. They lived just east of the Cowlitz River.
Edwin, a logger, spent three years during World War II helping to build the Alaska-Canada Highway and later worked in a sawmill.
“She basically raised us by herself,” Borte said. “Dad came home on most weekends.”
To raise money for school clothes, Borte picked berries, baby-sat and, at age 15, landed a job waiting tables at the Toledo Café. She attended school during the day, worked until midnight, then walked home.
“We walked everywhere,” she said. “We didn’t have a car at home. The grocery store we had in town here — Mom would go in on Saturday and they would deliver to us.”
At the café, Borte met Tony Borte, who had attended St. Mary’s Academy through eighth grade and worked as a truck driver, hauling 10-gallon milk cans to the Karlan Creamery in Toledo, which produced cheese. Hence, Toledo Cheese Days.
While dating, they usually saw a movie in Winlock or attended dances in Toledo where later a roller-skating rink and now City Hall and the food bank sit.
Only single people could attend school, so they married at St. Francis the Tuesday after Esther’s Friday graduation in 1945.
Tony Borte, who later drove trucks for the county, was a great-grandson of Theresa Plamondon, who married Quebec native Elie Sareault after he settled here in 1849.
Tony and Esther bought property on Second Street.
“We built a garage and lived in the garage,” Esther Borte said. “As we had kids we added rooms to the garage. It was all paid for. He did most of the work himself. I helped with building the house. We did everything together.”
They had six children: Eddie, Margaret, Mary, Chris, John and Angie.
In February 1971, Tony died of cancer at 61, leaving Esther Borte with three children still home. She worked as a janitor and ran the senior centers in Toledo and Winlock. She continued working for Toledo’s center until five years ago, when she became a volunteer.
She experienced tremendous heartache in 1999 when her 37-year-old daughter, Angie, died only days after being diagnosed with a brain tumor.
“It is the worst thing in the world,” she said. Ten years later, she lost another daughter, Margaret Milton, 61.
Esther Borte, who underwent heart surgery in 2009, has 13 grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren. She enjoys volunteering at the senior center “to keep busy.”
“What would I do if I wasn’t doing this? Sit here and eat and get fat,” she said.
