Elsie "Beth" Hudspeth

Ms. Elsie “Beth” Marie Schaufelberger Hudspeth, 88, passed away Tuesday, November 12, 2019.  Beth was born June 28, 1931 in Gleason, Wisconsin to Alexander and Ann Schaufelberger. Beth grew up on a rural dairy farm in Merrill, Wisconsin after her parents were compelled to leave Chicago during the height of the Great Depression. She spent her childhood heavily involved in the everyday business of a small dairy farm and enjoyed fishing and the necessity of hunting deer in the fields with her father. She was able to get a good education locally until she reached her teens and realized that the prospects of a future farming were not going to fulfill her ambitions. She was interested in a higher education and managed to secure a scholarship at St. Joseph’s School of Nursing in Marshfield, Wisconsin. After securing her degree in nursing, she took up practicing nursing at the University of California San Francisco Medical Center where she was involved in all aspects of nursing from pediatric to surgical. Trained at a Catholic nursing school, Beth was fastidious and devoted to the details of patient care that are the cornerstone of ideal nursing. It was in San Francisco that she met the surgical intern who would become the father of her five children. Beth settled in Winston-Salem when her husband decided to practice heart surgery at Baptist Hospital and devoted her life to her family for many years until she decided to again return to nursing. She served as a private duty nurse to many here in Winston-Salem and performed “miracles” with her patients by making their lives better in a myriad of ways. She continued to care for others as well as herself and lived out her life in her home until her death.

Beth is survived by her children, Dudley Hudspeth and wife Tammy, Grant Hudspeth, Deborah Hudspeth, Mark Hudspeth, and Glenn Hudspeth and wife Ruth; and her grandchildren, Eric, Emily, and Claire.

A celebration of Beth’s life will be held Thursday, November 21, 2019 at 1:00 PM at St. John’s Lutheran Church, 2415 Silas Creek Parkway, Winston-Salem, N.C. A private family burial at Salem Cemetery will follow the service. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that gifts be made to St. John’s Lutheran Church.