Janet Todd Yee passed away Monday, Feb. 27, 2006, in her home in Langley.

She was born in North Dakota to Della (Bystrom) and Arlo Robert Todd Jan. 28, 1925.

Her parents were both dentists, her mother also taught art. They eventually moved to Seattle. Yee’s parents separated for some years. She was raised in the Ballard neighborhood by her mother. She attended Ballard High School and showed an exceptional talent for ice skating.

She was the great niece of S.J. Shorey, founder of Shorey’s Bookstore, a landmark Seattle bookstore for most of the 20th century. She worked there in her teens.

Yee was known to her friends as Toddi or Todd. Following high school she attended the Burnley School of Art as had her mother. Burnley later became the Art Institute of Seattle. Todd transferred to the University of Washington Art Department where she trained as a talented fine artist.

She married Robert LaRue, who died of cancer shortly before their son Matthew was born. Todd remarried twice more. She had a son with her last husband, Robert Yee, David Kimball Yee. Todd and Bob divorced and Todd switched her major at the University of Washington to library science. She worked in the Health and Sciences Department.

Both sons preceded their mother in death.

Yee was swept up in the attack on free speech by the red-baiting Canwell Committee in 1948-49. The experience left an irreducible life-long commitment to free speech.

Janet Yee was active in the Seattle Folklore Society and very involved in the annual Folklife Festival, coordinating the arts and crafts exhibit.

She moved to Whidbey Island when she retired in 1985 and began restoring an old farmhouse in the Craftsman style. She became active in the Whidbey Women Artisans, South Whidbey Tilth and two local literary magazines, the Loon and the Island Independent. She and friend Jack Bock designed crossword puzzles for the latter.

She and friend, Susan Prescott, formed an herb business, Todd and Prescott, growing, processing, and marketing herbal vinegars for the local businesses and the South Whidbey Tilth Farmers’ Market.

She was instrumental in the reorganization of the statewide sustainable agriculture organization, Washington Tilth Association, in the late 1980s. She was very active in the local chapter on South Whidbey to promote biologically sound, socially equitable agriculture. She played a pivotal role in the organization’s decision to purchase land for an educational center.

A memorial potluck to honor Janet Todd Yee is planned at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, June 25, in the Freeland Library community room.

Yee’s life may be honored by supporting the American Civil Liberties Union, The Nature Conservancy, South Whidbey Tilth, and reading a banned book.