Dolores Remington

Dolores "Dody" Remington, 79, died Thursday (July 24, 2014) in University Hospital, surrounded by family and friends.

She was a quiet, humorous woman who sustained her family and community with good cheer, good advice and, sometimes, with raised eyebrows.

She began a career in journalism as assistant to the late Don Anderson, then publisher of the Wisconsin State Journal and later worked as a reporter for the Monona Community Herald and for Joan Collins Publicity before returning to the State Journal as assistant to the editor.

The latter was a job consisting - among many other duties - of corralling free-wheeling reporters and photographers and insisting they turn in time sheets when due, fielding scores of calls from readers about the daily and Sunday comics and compiling a weekly "Scrapbook" column that printed items too small for regular news coverage but which were vitally important to those whose names were printed. She also was custodian of a long-time newspaper feature, "Know Your Madisonian."

Dody also volunteered as a guide at the Governor's Mansion and as a photo cataloger for the State Historical Society.

But, really, those activities don't explain such a vibrant life. She loved sailing, was a member of the Lake Monona Sailing Club. She was a notorious bargainer. Her husband, Ward - a State Journal copy editor who died in 1983 - complained that when Dody bargained for their new station wagon she asked how much the dealer would drop the price if she refused the rear-view mirror.

She had a succession of Welsh Terriers - the current one, Dylan, survives her - that dragged her around her neighborhoods and made her life happy even in her later years as she struggled with declining health.

So far as anyone knows, Dody Remington never lost a friend and rarely met anyone who didn't become a friend.

She is survived by her son, Dan Remington, his wife, Wanda, and by her daughter, Kate, and Kate's husband, Dick and grandson, Sam, and by her cousin, Mildred Peterson.

The funeral will be at 10 a.m. Tuesday July 29, 2014 at the CRESS FUNERAL HOME, 3610 Speedway Road, a visitation where friends may call from 4 p.m. - 7 p.m. Monday and Tuesday after 9 a.m. until the time of the service on Tuesday. Burial will be in Prairie Mound Cemetery, Oregon. The Rev. William R. Wineke, a friend and former colleague of both Dody and Ward Remington, will preside.