Profile: Helen Graybeal Young

Centenarian, '25

Helen Graybeal Young '25 Turns 100

When Helen Graybeal Young '25 celebrated her birthday, her gifts included a copy of the 1925 Pikes Peak Nugget from President Celeste.

"I'm 100 and one week old," she says when I interview her by phone. She laughs at the thought. Laughter fills all Young's recollections, but she is serious about current events and the problems of her hometown, Pueblo.

Helen Graybeal grew up in Pueblo where her father was a successful rancher and businessman. She was the first person in her family to go to college, and she enjoyed it. She remembers her CC days as full of fun. "We had regular dances at the school and at a dance place a few miles away."

Students did a lot of walking in those days, and parking was not an issue. "Only one young man had a car. It was really beautiful, and he wouldn't let his friends drive it. He said, 'It's not every year my father buys me a car.'" Young savors the understatement.

She admits to being less than serious about her major, English. "If I got an A, I didn't work as hard the next semester." Young remembers the art history class which introduced her to the art and architecture she saw in later travels with her husband, also a CC grad. Young met William Gould Young '24 her very first day at CC.

"I always said I wouldn't marry a man unless he was smarter than I was. Then they gave us a test. He was genius level, and I was only normal." She chuckles.

The couple settled in California. An outstanding chemist, he eventually became vice chancellor of UCLA. The Youngs traveled all over the world, including the Far East. When I ask if she has any advice for CC students today, she says, "Oh, no - except, good luck." I hear a smile in her voice - her legacy is her joyful attitude.

—Mary Ellen Davis '73