How does a “farm chick” with three younger sisters from Beaverton, Michigan, become Bristol Who’s Who National Woman of the Year? With grace and determination.

It all started on a family pig and cash crop farm where Mom was a smart, valedictorian of her graduating class and Dad was a hard working machinist at Dow Chemical Company in Midland, Michigan. Mom prided herself on cultivating straight rows of sugar beets and navy beans while thriving in the tax season where she prepared complicated rural tax returns for the neighborhood farmers. As a teenager—Jan’s physical labor lessons about hoeing beans, sewing the latest fashions in a 4-H club and gardening were learned early and well.

Jan was a good student in high school, finishing fourth in her class, excelled at Central Michigan University with a 3.5 out of 4.0 for the first two years. She got a bit sidetracked while marrying her college sweetheart, David Thomas, and welcoming their son Marc a year later, ultimately finishing with honors at Michigan State University, East Lansing campus December 1973 with a Bachelor of Arts in Advertising and a marketing minor.

She received her degree followed by a divorce decree in January 1974. Marc, now 48, is also a dedicated student pursuing his doctorate in education administration while teaching on-line classes at a local community college.

The master’s degree in public administration, health care track, included writing a thesis on documenting the medical record succinctly and completely. She formally presented to all St. Lawrence Hospital colleagues and supervisors in mental health and substance abuse programs as a regular in-service starting in 1978. It was a prototype with modified versions in use today.

Significantly, her first job after graduation was in kitchen design at Hager-Fox Company in Lansing, Michigan. She selected state of the art countertops, fabrics, paint and wallpaper colors for local builders, contractors and general consumers. Today, Jan is pursuing a small design and decorating business called Divine Designs—for out of this world interiors. Her tasteful home on Emerald Forest Circle is a showplace with dark hardwood floors, neutral ceramic floor tiles, beautiful area rugs, and comfy modern upholstered furniture in grays, blues, teals, beiges and browns.

Jan’s career began in 1975 with mental health and substance abuse programs in Michigan hospitals and continued until retirement as a case manager from Anchorage Community Mental Health Services in Alaska in from September 2003 until September 2011. The mainstay of this profession was giving personal assistance to a caseload of mentally and emotionally compromised adult clients. She helped over 500 people in eight years. Work duties included meeting with individuals monthly, implementing and designing small weekly educational /recreational support groups, and documenting all significant daily activity on the medical record.

At this time you’ll find Jan giving back to her community by filling in as a volunteer at a local alcohol and drug abuse phone clearinghouse, facilitating weekly meditation support groups in her home and watching wildlife including winter birds, otters and whitetail deer from her shaded deck in the woods. “Life is good.”