Mattie ErvaGene DeAragon was born on Feb. 12, 1929, on a ranch south of McDonald, KS, to Erwin W. and Hazel A. Alden during a blizzard. ErvaGene, the eldest of their three children, passed away on Oct. 5, 2026. Her father, a WWI veteran who ran the Bird City Co-op, died when she was twelve. When she was 16, her mother married Arlie Smith, a Cheyenne County farmer. ErvaGene attended Bird City High School, where she played the clarinet in the marching band and was elected senior class president.

ErvaGene attended the Univ. of Colorado at Boulder, where she met Navy veteran Raymond J. DeAragon of Denver. They married on Sept. 19, 1949. She worked for a time at the Russell Stover candy company. The couple had five children: RaGena C., Robert J., Randal J., Raymond J., and Renee C. DeAragon.

In 1954, they moved with RaGena to the San Francisco Bay Area of California. Ray worked as a professional photographer and ErvaGene in the accounting dept. of the Bank of America before the birth of Robert and Randal. From 1959-1961, they lived in Colorado, where Raymond was born, then returned to California. ErvaGene earned an associate degree while working in classified accounting at the San Mateo Times newspaper. She also worked part-time at Macy's department store. At 39, she gave birth to Renee. She was a Cub Scout den mother in Burlingame, CA, for many years and taught in the CCD program for Roman Catholic children in public schools.

In 1992 ErvaGene retired and moved to St. Francis, KS, to care for her mother. There she served for twelve years as director of the Senior Center. As an active member of the AARP, Area on Aging, and American Legion Auxiliary, she advocated for the elderly in Kansas and rural regions in the U.S. She also assisted efforts to build a permanent home for the Cheyenne County Historical Museum in St. Francis.

ErvaGene enjoyed musicals, plays, concerts, museums, and travel. She was a superb guide of San Francisco for visiting family. In 1994, she toured England, Scotland and Wales by car with RaGena, then flew alone to Switzerland for a train journey through the Alps. Her travels in the US took her to most of the states west of the Mississippi, Alaska, Hawaii, Washington DC, and Florida. Her trip in 2005 to DC was to receive an award for a photo of work on the St. Francis Senior Center from the U.S. Senate Committee on Aging.

She is survived by her sister Geraldine ("Jerry") Cress, her brother John Alden, her five children, three granddaughters (Reyna, Jessica, Richelle) and three great-grandsons (Matthew, Jacob, Oliver). A memorial service will be held in spring, 2027.