Vernadine Virginia (Egolf) Bailey Obituary

Dean Bailey was a woman of great style, but even greater substance. She was a woman with an adventurous spirit, a kind heart and a level head, a woman who lived a full and fulfilling life. She was a wonderful wife, mother and grandmother, and a woman who earned everything she had. Dean was a colorful lady, who always said one day she'd just turn into a pink cloud, high up in the sky, floating off to the heavens above. Those that knew her best could believe it: Dean could always do anything.

Dean was born Vernadine Virginia Egolf on October 3, 1917, a cool Wednesday in Muskegon, to Eli and Leona (Hart) Egolf. Dean was born in a little house just a block from Clock Funeral Home, close to Muskegon High School, but didn't have an easy start to life. Her parents feared she wouldn't live through the night, so they carefully wrapped her up, and put her near the stove to keep her warm. She survived, of course, coming into the world with style, naturally.

Dean was the middle child of three, joining older stepbrother Virgil and eventually younger sister Elaine. The Egolfs were quite a large extended family, with a proud heritage, and were considered a Colonial family, as distant relatives came across the Atlantic on the Mayflower.

Dean's father worked at Clarke Floor Machine in Muskegon, but there were many years, during the steely grip of the Great Depression, he and Virgil would fish the rivers in Muskegon to help put food on the table. Virgil was a great older brother, and Dean fondly remembered the times he would pull her in a wagon to the store.

Dean attended Muskegon Public Schools until she was old enough to help support the family, taking a sewing job at the Amazon Building. But soon enough her life would change for the better.

Dean met quite a stylish young man named James Albert Bailey, a self-employed man who took over his family's poultry business at the tender age of 12, and they instantly hit it off. She and James would cruise around Muskegon in his stylish, 1931 Roadster, as their love bloomed. They were married on July 6, 1937. Two years later, in 1939, they built the only home they would ever live in, on Holton Road (M-120) in North Muskegon.

Together Dean and James had three daughters, yet sadly, their first daughter, JoAnn, was stillborn. But Dean and James were soon blessed with the healthy births of Bonita and Lindra, filling their home and their lives with happiness.

Dean helped James run the poultry business, which they ran as a true partnership for 30 years, from 1937-1967, and Bailey Poultry kept Dean very busy. Not surprisingly, Dean would never hesitate to do whatever needed done, even feeding, plucking and cleaning the chickens herself. Together they would deliver fresh (and later frozen) chickens to grocers all over West Michigan. The Baileys were quite the entrepreneurs, and in addition to the poultry business owned a contracting business which built nearly 70 homes in the Reeths-Puffer area of Muskegon. The couple also owned and operated a grocery store in Montague for three years, and Bonita fondly remembers working there with her mother. Bonita would also help clean the chickens and even some turkeys as a child.

But Dean made sure everything they did was a family affair, and was an excellent wife, mother and later grandmother and great-grandmother. Dean encouraged her children to be as adventurous as she was, and Bonita had a horse growing up, while Lindra got an aluminum boat and motor, which she still has to this day.

Dean was very involved in her daughters' lives, and was very active in the Reeths-Puffer Schools PTA, as well as several community organizations and in Dalton Baptist Church. Her daughters remember fondly just how busy the Bailey household was!

But it wasn't all work and no play for Dean, of course. Her spirit led her and James on many adventures over the years. She always believed in having fun, and she and her husband would head off in their motor home, exploring parts unknown. Once they even went on a caravan to Mexico, where they were waylaid by a band of bandits, who forced them at gunpoint to take a man with a gunshot wound to the nearest hospital!

Dean's adventures didn't end there, of course. She also slept on platforms in the middle of the Florida Everglades (crocs and all), and would run out into their road to save stray pigs and runaway horses! But that was Dean, always fearless.

Dean and James loved to travel together, and visited Hawaii, as well as owning a cottage in Baldwin for 25 years. In later years they also owned a cottage in Lake George, Florida. And after James sadly died in 1982, Dean's wanderlust continued. She even traveled to China in the mid-80s. She wasn't much of a shutterbug, taking few photos of her adventures, but she always brought back jewelry for herself and her family.

Dean had so many hobbies, from square dancing with the Maycroft Square Tappers, to the "Puddlejumpers" antique car club, to volunteering at Hackley Hospital. She was a woman with a keen intellect, and loved keeping up with politics and current events, and could always give you the latest on how the stock market was doing. And after they had retired, James and Dean took up real estate as a hobby, mostly as a way to help people fulfill their dreams of home ownership, giving them good deals and financing if they needed it. Dean always loved to help others, any way she could.

But Dean's greatest passion was always for her family. She absolutely adored her children and grandchildren. She loved spending the holidays with her growing family, where she would use her excellent cooking skills to make wonderful pies and chicken wings. She made so many delicious pies, in fact, that the family would start devouring them a day before the official get-together! But always a classy, graceful and generous woman, Dean made sure everyone she knew had a place to go for the holidays, opening her home to them if they didn't.

Dean was a woman of great style, and even greater substance, a woman of grace, of class, and of character. She was fond of saying "No matter what you've done, always tell the truth," but the truth about Dean is that she was truly one of a kind. "Some day, I'll turn into a little pink cloud," she used to say. About an hour after she died, the new morning dawned, full of bright sunshine, freshly-fallen snow, and blue skies dotted with "little pink clouds." She went out in style, just like she always said she would. Not that we ever doubted she would, not for a minute.

Dean could always do anything.

Her Family includes: 2 daughters, Bonita (Clarence) Webster of North Muskegon and Lindra (Gary) Santo of North Muskegon; 5 grandchildren, Kim (Kevin) Bowers, Jim (Renee) Webster, Jeff (Pati) Webster, Chris (Tammy) Santo and Gary Dean (Kim) Santo; 10 great-grandchildren, Justin Bowers, Kara Bowers, Travis Webster, Madison Webster, Cassie Webster, Jack Webster, Steven Santo, Michael Santo, Megan Santo, Brittany Santo; 3 nephews, Lee, Kevin and Brian Miller. She was preceded in death by her husband James in 1982; daughter, JoAnn; sister, Elaine Miller and by a step-brother, Virgil Egolf.