I first met Helen Hegg when both of us were between jobs and attending a group at Grays Harbor WorkSource. By far, she was the oldest and most energetic person in the group of then-unemployed displaced workers, and both of us would soon find ourselves working in the local newspaper industry.

Months later, I would go on to profile Helen for The Daily World, when both of us were fully back doing what we do best.

Here’s what I wrote a the time: “Helen Hegg already has been celebrated at three retirement parties in what has been a circuitous Grays Harbor career in sales, business and public service, and the 78-year-old Hoquiam woman doesn’t plan on another retirement anytime soon. On her birthday the year before, Sunny 102.1 radio personality Rhys Davis joked, ‘Everybody knows Helen Hegg. She’s retired more times than Brett Favre.’ It was a party of another sort —Tupperware parties, a marketing fixture of the 1960s — that first taught the indefatigable Hegg she had something valuable to sell: a tireless spirit and boundless determination.”

Davis still vividly remembers the Brett Favre analogy. “I was amazed she even knew who Brett was! She always had a smile on her face when we got together, she reminded me of that morning up until the end,” said Davis, who has known Hegg since the two started working together in 1979 at the KBKW radio station.

At 84, Helen retired one final time on July 12. The notice of her death came from Harrison Family Mortuary. Married three times and happily single since 1979, Hegg leaves 14 granddaughters, four grandsons, 10 great-grandsons and four great-granddaughters. Many more people will always consider her a friend.

“She had a powerful and energetic persona, a joy of life itself, a deep love for her family and she truly loved Grays Harbor,” recalled Lora Malakoff, who worked with Helen for years at the Senior Sunset Times.

“Helen Hegg was more than someone I worked with, we were friends. We leaned on each other for nearly a decade for strength when facing the loss of loved ones, life’s bumps along the way and when we faced her mortality. Turns out she is still teaching me about life even as she left us behind,” Malakoff said.

Grays Harbor County Commissioner Vickie Raines recalled Hegg as a “compassionate, yet a very strong woman. Helen was certainly independent, she had her way of viewing things, and she certainly wasn’t afraid to speak her mind!”

Bill Wolfenbarger, president and sales manager of Jodesha Broadcasting in Aberdeen, worked with Helen Hegg over the past two decades.

“Helen didn’t just ‘make a sale,’ she developed long-term relationships. Whether she sold furniture, cable, chamber memberships, radio, or newspaper advertising, she always worked in the best interest of her clients and customers,” Wolfenbarger said.

As someone who started out selling Tupperware at neighborhood parties, Hegg became a maverick who passed on her skills to others.

“Helen never stopped selling, and she never stopped training others,” Wolfenbarger said. “During one phase of Helen’s long and rewarding career, she wore the colorful hat of sales manager at Jodesha. In more recent times, as recently as last month, she was still finding time to train others. We all loved Helen, not just because she was smart, tenacious, persistent, positive (among her qualities), but she was a genuinely warm human being. Helen, we’ll miss you so much!”

Among her many positions, Hegg served as president of Habitat for Humanity of Grays Harbor, development director for the Grays Harbor Chamber of Commerce, taught a senior exercise class at the Karr House assisted living center, and sold advertising for the Senior Sunset Times and Jodesha Broadcasting. She was among those who started the Relay for Life (then called the Cancer Run) in Grays Harbor with KAYO Radio.

“Our affiliate started in 2001, and Helen was involved from the beginning,” said Diane Smith, current board president for Habitat for Humanity of Grays Harbor. “She continued her dedication and commitment to the Habitat mission of helping families have safe, healthy and affordable housing for 15 years. She served as president of the board of directors twice and was probably involved on every committee at one time or another.”

Alex Player, former Habitat board member who worked with Helen for many years, summarized how we all feel about Helen by stating, “Helen’s years of work to make Habitat a vital part of Grays Harbor are truly appreciated. Her enthusiasm and spunky personality will long be remembered and greatly missed.”

“She loved Grays Harbor, the people, businesses, and the wonderful many things Grays Harbor has to offer,” Raines said. “Helen was a wonderful representative and advocate for Grays Harbor; very proud and always willing to represent Grays Harbor in every way she could. That was just Helen. I will always remember her wide, bright smile and her laughter. Her laughter was easily recognizable and identifiable of her presence, wherever she was.”

After leaving the Chamber of Commerce, Malakoff said, Hegg asked if she could come “play newspaper with me. Of course I said, ‘yes.’ From there, we spent seven years having such fun. She loved visiting with clients, and being a big piece of the Senior Sunset Times. Just a couple of weeks prior to passing away she was still doing what she loved. Helen always laughed saying, ‘People wouldn’t believe that this paper is run by two little old ladies, would they?’”

Another colleague at Jodesha Broadcasting, Georgia Bravos, said Hegg actually trained her in sales and stressed goal-setting as part of her inspirational friendship over the years

“People may not know that Helen was doing sales training as recent as three weeks prior to her passing,” Bravos said. “Helen’s drive and zest for life was infectious, she loved her community, clients, friends and most importantly her family. Helen’s work ethic was beyond impressive it was downright supernatural.”

Malakoff said Helen knew she was ill last year but chose quality of life over treatment.

In the profile for The Daily World, she acknowledged she had been diagnosed with a rare blood disease, essential thrombocytosis, which caused her to have too many blood platelets of unknown origin. When she was diagnosed, Hegg went online for information and learned the condition often is fatal and the average person lives with it for only seven to 11 years. She lived far longer than that, and was a staunch advocate of healthy eating.

Even at a breakfast interview, she made sure the reporter had egg whites and oatmeal with no sugar, and absolutely no salt.

Of her most recent illness, Malakoff said, “She didn’t want anyone grieving before it was absolutely necessary. That’s the kind of person she was. She told me her fears, we cried together and laughed together so often this last year. It was a hard year, watching her face this terminal disease, seeing her signature vivacious energy wane away. But as only Helen Hegg could, she did it with ladylike grace tinged with a hearty bit of her signature sarcastic humor.”

Malakoff noted that Helen helped “many needful individuals without any fanfare or expectation of anything in return.” She also called her “possibly the most physically active person I’ve ever known; listening to her exercise schedule would make anyone need a nap!”

“Birthdays were important milestones for Helen,” Malakoff added. “ On her 84th birthday we had our last lunch date at Deidra’s out on the deck in the sunshine and then we sat in my car for a few minutes before her birthday party at Jodesha Broadcasting. She knew it was probably the last time she would see her friends there. There were some tears, not mine, she scolded me as Helen did, ‘Sweetie pie, you have to hold it together for me until I’m done doing this thing and then you can just have at it, okay?’ We fixed her makeup, she squared her shoulders and off we went to her party. I will miss her, how could I not? She was ‘my Helen.’ my partner in shenanigans and dear friend. People like her are rare in this world. It was such an honor for her to call me her friend.”