Adele R. Nickel

September 6, 1919 - April 22, 2017

Dodo, as Adele was known, died at the age of 97 following a short illness. She was born and raised in Santa Barbara and Carpinteria, CA, the second daughter of Ruth Driver Rock and John Fairbanks Rock. She attended the Santa Barbara School for Girls, Mills College and the University of California, Berkeley where she was a member of the Alpha Phi sorority. At Berkeley, she met both John S. Selfridge whom she married after graduation and George W. Nickel, Jr. She and John had three children: Kinzie (Bob), Cynthia, and Jock (Martha). After John’s death in 1954 from Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, she became reacquainted with George Nickel. In June, 1955, they married, merging her three children and George’s five children: Sally, Susan, Jim (Kathy), Nancy, and Miller (Kathi). Together they raised eight children. She leaves sixteen grandchildren and twelve great-grandchildren. Dodo was preceded in death by John Selfridge, George W. Nickel, Jr., and her sons, Jock Selfridge and Miller Nickel.

She was a passionate gardener who loved her beautiful garden along the Kern River. As an avid dominoes player, Dodo spent many hours teaching her grandchildren and greatgrandchildren the subtleties of the game. In her day, she was a fierce tennis and golf player, expert duck-hunter, and bridge player. Dodo was known to her family and those who knew her as a gracious, generous, and wise woman.

The family would like to thank her Companion Care providers from Around the Clock and the Hoffman Hospice for their care and assistance in the last weeks of her life. Memorials may be sent to California Living Museum (CALM), Hoffman Hospice, The George and Adele Nickel Scholarship for Education in Production Agriculture at University of California, Davis, Planned Parenthood, The Nickel Family Scholarship for Agricultural Education Fund at the Kern Community Foundation or a charity of your choice. Services are pending.