IN MEMORIAM: Mabel Graham, 88;
Worked With Nobelist Donnell Thomas
MIDDLEFIELD – Mabel (Dubben) Graham, 88, who worked at Bassestt Hospital with Nobel Prize winner E. Donnell Thomas, M.D., died peacefully of natural causes early in the morning of April 2, 2019, in Bellevue, Wash.
She began her life Dec. 3, 1930, in Cooperstown. She was the second child of Dorothy and George Dubben, Middlefield dairy farmers.
Mabel started her schooling in Middlefield, graduated from Cherry Valley Central and finished with a degree from Broome Tech Community College in Binghamton.
She married Marine Ted Graham, from Cherry Valley, in Las Vegas, Nev., on April 25, 1953, and returned to Upstate New York. They were married for 63 years until his death in 2017.
Daughter Patricia Lynn Graham was born in 1954.
Mabel worked in Dr. Thomas’ hematology lab at Bassett.
The family moved to Bellevue, Wash., in 1963, where Ted joined Thomas’ transplantation research team. Mabel continued working in hematology and research labs in Seattle until her retirement in 1995 from the Puget Sound Blood Center.
Left to celebrate her are daughter, Pat Graham, son-in-law, Steve Fisher, grandson, Graham Fisher, all living in Washington. Mabel’s sisters, Margaret Yerdon and Flora Polulech remain in New York State with nieces, nephews, Green and Dubben cousins.
Family, friends and old classmates of Mabel’s are invited to attend a gathering in the Café of the old Cherry Valley Central School between 2 and 4 p.m., Saturday, May 25.