Candita Shreeve Childers

Candita Shreeve Childers, 94, passed away on Sunday, February 11, 2018. Visitation for Candita S. Childers, 94, will be from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, February 20, 2018 at O’Connor Memorial Chapel. A funeral service will be at 2:00 p.m. on Wednesday, February 21, also at O’Connor Memorial Chapel. Interment will follow at Highland Cemetery.Arrangements are in the care of O’Connor Funeral Home. Candita was born August 13, 1923 in Baltimore, Maryland to Frank and Grace Shreeve Palmisano. She was the eldest of four siblings; sisters Marcelene and Loree; and brother Joel. It was in Baltimore that Candita met Paul Childers, a farm boy from Alabama whose father was a Minister. They were married on November 29, 1941 in Lucedale, Mississippi where Paul was in the Coast Guard. After the war, they lived on a farm in Alabama where Candita experienced the life of a farmer’s wife. City girl married to a country boy was a learning process for her. Four rooms and a path, kerosene lamps, buckets dipped from a spring downhill, boiling jeans in a black pot, using a scrub board, one end of a cross-cut saw, wood stove, milking cows, working at a syrup mill, canning, chopping cotton, hoeing, gardening, using the hay rake with horses, and eventually driving the tractor and learning to cook.Her teacher was her husband. After four years, opportunities opened up for them to minister. Candita played the accordion and sang all over the U.S. in Camp Meetings and conferences. Paul accompanied Candita with the saxophone as she sang and played multiple instruments. Candita and Paul were Missionaries in Colombia, Nigeria, Peru, and Venezuela. In 1977 Candita and Paul took a hiatus from the foreign mission field and they lived in Charlotte, NC. In 1994 they returned to Pucallpa, Peru in the jungle area where they had a houseboat and would minister to people alongside the river. In 2000, Candita became a widow in Peru. He died when they were missionaries in the jungle there. Her daughter Maxima brought her back to the States to live with her family. Candita was active at the Eagle’s Manor as Secretary for the Residence Council. She always enjoyed composing songs and playing and singing. Candita is survived by two daughters Mona and Maxima both of Great Falls; three siblings Marcelene, Loree, and Joel; five grandchildren; eight great grandchildren; and one great-great grandchild. She was preceded in death by her parents and husband Paul. In lieu of flowers the family suggests memorials to Peace Hospice, P.O. Box 7008, Great Falls, MT 59406-7008.