Sondra May (Owen) Shryock

Sondra was born during the locally famous 1949 Valentine’s Day blizzard. That kept her a week at Boise Hospital before she could come home.

Her dad, Roger Owen, had family migrating to Emmett in the 1870's with some family scattering south. Sondra and 5 siblings grew up on a small family farm near Meridian. Roger was of the “Great Generation” having come of age during the great depression. Predictably, he valued good character and good work. He heard of work in Iowa and set off before finishing high school. Riding the rails involved big chances. He came back without a job and without a leg. Needless to say, her family struggled.

Although the 50's and 60's were becoming good times, not everyone now imagines what it was like for families not caught up. Sondra not only could imagine it, she lived it. Secretly, however, she held big dreams. She applied herself as a student and dreamed of someday going to college. When they gave aptitude tests in Jr. High, the counselor called her in and said she was 6th in spatial relations. She asked, “In the whole school?”. He replied, “No, the whole nation”. She left wondering what to do with it.

Sondra got a high school job at the Soil Conservation Service and saved most her money towards her secret dream. She enrolled at ISU in Pocatello in 1967. Soon she was accepted into the challenging new dental hygiene program. Before finishing up her B.S. degree in 1971, she met her future husband, Arnold Shryock, at school. They married on October 30th, 1971 while she was still working as a “hat” hygienist in Burley-Rupert (hygienists then wore a nurse-like cap with a different colored band).

In 1972, Sondra moved to Boise with her husband. Over the next 10 years she worked as a hygienist for respected dentists in Boise, Meridian and Emmett. She also maintained a residence in McCall while her husband worked for the Central District Health Department in Valley County. In McCall, her son, Abe, was born in 1975 and her daughter, Erica Topaz, in 1977.

In 1982, an Alaskan dentist tried to recruit her to Fairbanks. Her family agreed and she loved her Fairbanks job. She was also learning her spacial relations gift was perfectly suited to her career. Able to take flawless X-rays, she found that after viewing them she could work deep under patient gums as if seeing through the gums. For periodontal patients, she could restore healthy teeth and gums with minimal pain or tissue damage. In 1984, when her husband accepted work in Kodiak, she worked there. That expanded to the Matanuska and Anchorage area. Her employers were becoming lifelong friends. Sondra was appointed to the Alaska State Board of Dental Examiners and held positions as secretary and chairman during her term.

By 2006, she realized she was developing a chronic disease, Parkinson’s. It was getting harder to do what she loved: hiking, running, bicycling and camping. Even though she loved living in Kodiak, she wanted to go home to family. Moving to Nampa and with family support, she found enjoyment at Nampa’s “Rec” Center and Boise’s “Parkinson’s Dance” (partly supported by Ballet Idaho).

Very early in the morning on November 3, 2025 while in “rehab” after illness, she passed on. Comparing notes, both her daughter in Alaska and husband here realized they were awake at that time and thinking of her.