Lillian Webster

Lillian Mae (Tlustosch) Webster, 96, died Nov. 30, 2021, at Hosanna Assisted Living Home of Great Falls, Mont.

She was born Sept. 18, 1925, in Dagmar, Mont., to William and Edna Tlustosch, the oldest of three girls. After the death of her mother at a young age, she was raised by her father and his second wife, Mary, whom she recognized as her mom, and gained another sister and a brother.

At 18, she set out to Washington to find her way, working in TB sanitariums and as a “Rosie the Riveter” building military planes.

While in Tacoma, Wash., her childhood sweetheart, Wayne Webster, came calling and they were married June 9, 1945. The happy couple returned to the Webster family farm outside of Froid, Mont., and welcomed daughter Georgia June 14, 1946, and son Wayne June 29, 1947.

Lillian worked alongside her family on the farm, becoming a snowbirds in Arizona in the late 1960s, until Wayne’s death Jan. 15, 1975. Without her husband, Arizona was not the same and she returned only once, staying on the farm, caring for her mother-in-law Ethel Webster until she moved to Great Falls, Mont., in 1987 to be closer to her daughter and grandchildren.

In Great Falls, Lillian found a calling as a live-in caretaker for the elderly and developed friendships with the women she cared for and their families.

Lillian had a lifelong passion for reading and gardening and it was best to keep her far from a book or plant if she was needed anywhere else. She also loved to paint and would take her little RV out to find new scenery, sometimes getting lost in