Iva Kelsay

TAYLOR MILL - Iva Perkins Kelsay was a Kentucky Colonel, a retired librarian and an accountant on the Manhattan Project.
But in her 92 years, the long-time Kenton County resident was probably best known for helping others, both as a teacher and a volunteer.
For 23 years, Mrs. Kelsay taught at Covington's Fourth District School. When arthritis made it hard for her to stand all day, she moved from the classroom to processing books for all of Covington Public Schools' libraries.
After her retirement from Covington schools, Mrs. Kelsay continued volunteering at St. Elizabeth Medical Center and the former Booth Hospital in Covington. "She was always trying to help people out," said her son, Steve Kelsay of Columbia, S.C.
During her final years at Rosedale Manor Nursing home, many of Mrs. Kelsay's former students stopped by for a visit.
"She was always trying to teach people how to sew," Kelsay said. "Even at the rest home, she was sewing little purses for people to hang on their wheelchairs."
Mrs. Kelsay died Wednesday 4/2 at St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Edgewood of kidney failure. The Taylor Mill resident was 92.
A member of the Retired Teachers Association, she also was a charter member of Taylor Mill United Methodist Church, which she attended for 50 years.
Born in Four Mile, Ky. by the Cumberland Gap, she was raised in a coal camp in Rockholds, Ky. when her father took a job as an accountant for the mines.
After her mother died of tuberculosis when she was 12, she was raised by her grandmother.
Because much of her family worked for the railroads, Mrs. Kelsay moved to southern Kenton County in the late 1940s with family members after L&N Railroad moved its yards from Corbin to Decoursey, her son said.
She went to the George Peabody College (now Vanderbilt) and graduated from Eastern Kentucky University.
One of Mrs. Kelsay's early teaching jobs was in Johnson, Tenn. She also worked as an accountant on the Manhattan Project to develop the first nuclear weapons, her son said. Her late husband was involved in the processing of uranium at the Oak Ridge, Tenn. facility.
"Because of the secrecy, nobody on the Manhattan Project knew what anyone else did," Steve Kelsay said. "(Physicists J.) Robert Oppenheimer and Enrico Fermi used to have dinner with my parents and other workers on the Manhattan Project, and nobody knew who they were. They just knew that they were big wigs at the factory."
Mrs. Kelsay was preceded in death by her husband, Kenneth "Tom" Kelsay, and her daughter, Linda Kelsay Doud.
Besides her son, Steve, survivors include two grandsons, Sean and Ian Kelsay. Visitation will be 10 -11 a.m. Saturday at Swindler & Currin Funeral Home in Latonia. Services are at 11 a.m. at the funeral home. Burial will be in Floral Hills Memorial Gardens in Taylor Mill.
Memorials can be sent to Taylor Mill United Methodist Church, 5160 Taylor Mill Road, Taylor Mill, KY 41015.