Rachael Alyce Hoover Olejniczak

Our Beloved Mother, Rachael Alyce Hoover Olejniczak passed peacefully from this mortal life just three days shy of celebrating her 100th birthday. She was born on April 30, 1925, in the small logging camp of McGaffey, New Mexico, to Ophelia and James Quinones.

Raised in Gallup, New Mexico, Rachael was joined by a baby brother, Manuel when she was three. A graduate of Gallup High School in 1944, she enjoyed the friendship of many fellow students, several with whom she shared lasting connections. Her faith in God was strong, and she attended Sacred Heart Catholic Church while living in Gallup.

She loved to paint and draw throughout her school career. Her dream was to train in design, and become a dress designer, a skill she was to later exhibit as she fashioned creative clothing for girl children.

During her last years in high school, she and several friends ventured down to the Santa Fe Depot in Gallup to bid farewell to fellow students bound for boot camps in California on a troop train. It was there she met the man who would become her husband. A young soldier named Earl Hoover from West Virginia, was heading west on the same train and convinced Rachael’s girlfriend to provide her address.

After two years of long-distance letter communications between Western Europe and New Mexico, the soldier returned to the USA, and the courtship continued. The two married on December 1, 1945, and soon headed west with the Santa Fe railroad to San Bernardino, California, where Earl was able to use the skills he learned in WWII and landed a position as a diesel electrician until his early death in 1962.

Rachael loved her role as wife, mother, and homemaker. She supported her four children in the many interests and activities in which they wished to participate. She became very active in the PTA at all school levels, while supporting school-based clubs and sports. Rachael had joined St Catherine Catholic church in the small community of Rialto, where she encouraged her children to take part in receiving all the Sacraments of their youth. She always welcomed school and church friends of the ‘Hoover kids’ and Michelle’s friends from Aquinas High School on many occasions throughout their school years.

Sadly, Rachael became a widow at age 37, due to Earl’s early death from cancer at age 43. She was left to raise her children alone, but her unwavering faith in God guided her future choices. Circumstances led her to take a job at a West Coast-based furniture chain, where she advanced and flourished as Office Manager of the firm until her retirement in 1993 after over 30 years with the company.

Five years after losing Earl, Rachael found love again in the guise of Arthur ‘Ski’ Olejniczak. They married and eventually welcomed a baby daughter, Michelle Marie, who was reared

along with her niece Kristen. Rachael loved gathering her family around her as often as possible, mostly in the family home built in 1952. Christmas Eve dinner would always include homemade Posole, enchiladas and Biscochitos for dessert! Her legendary cooking skills and recipes inspired at least three generations of her progeny, including at least 4 grandsons and 2 great-grandsons to become prolific in the kitchen.

In 2019, Rachael ‘returned to her roots’ when she joined her eldest daughter and son-in-law in their move from Southern California to Farmington, NM, where she enjoyed the open spaces and the acquaintance of their close neighborhood and church family.

Rachael was preceded in death by her beloved Grandparents, Parents, Brother Manuel, Aunts and Uncles, and her much-loved daughter Sheryl Alice Spada in 2020. She is survived and profoundly missed by her living children Earleen (Don) Dudley of Farmington, NM, Brad (Mary Jean) Hoover & Cynthia (Jim) Clifford, (both of Gallup, and Michelle Campa of San Diego County, Ca., as well as her 10 grandchildren, 11 Great-grandchildren, 1 great-great-grandson, several cousins, and many nieces and nephews, living throughout New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, Colorado, California and Washington State.

Private interment is planned on Monday, May 19, at 10 am Sunset Memorial Park in Gallup, New Mexico. A Celebration of Rachael’s Life and a Terrazas-Quinones Family Gathering is planned for June 28, 2025, in Gallup, NM.