Teresa Deshon passes away

SANDPOINT — Sandpoint has lost another one of its colorful matrons.

Teresa Deshon passed away Wednesday at Holy Family Hospital in Spokane, Wash., following a battle with cancer. She was in her 80s.

“Teresa was a fixture in our community and will be greatly missed by all who knew her,” said Councilwoman Helen Newton.

Deshon served on the City Council from 1978 to 1988 and was also a city Planning Commission member.

“She was a treat,” said Newton.

In 1987, former Gov. Cecil Andrus made her the first appointee to the fledgling Idaho Lottery Commission. Deshon left the lottery board in 2006.

Women Honoring Women named Deshon a “Woman of Wisdom” in 2001.

“Teresa burns enough midnight oil to fill a tanker truck,” one person wrote in their letter of nomination for Deshon as a “Woman of Wisdom.”

Women Honoring Women was founded by Councilwoman-elect Marsha Ogilvie in 1999 to celebrate women who touch lives in the community.

Ogilvie was not immediately available for comment on Wednesday night.

Deshon’s fingerprints can be found on Sandpoint City Beach and the bleachers at the Bonner County Fairgrounds. She was also a pillar of the arts and humanities community.

She helped initiate The Legion of Fine Arts, the precursor to the Pend Oreille Arts Council, and was a member of the Festival at Sandpoint’s advisory board.

Festival lore holds that Deshon put legendary crooner Tony Bennett up in her guest cottage on Lake Pend Oreille when he played the event in 1993. Bennett reportedly ate Fruit Loops at her kitchen counter and painted landscape art in her yard.