Bakery Business Started By 72 Year Old
Shirley Kuhnley was 69 years old three years ago when she graduated from a nine-month culinary arts class in Portland, Oregon’s largest city. Then she worked a year at another bakery, and she took a year to establish her business, refurbish her location, and open up. According to the story in the paper, Shirley said:
“You know, if you’re not busy, you sit home, get fat and die — mentally and physically. That sounds kind of harsh, but it’s true. Someone asked me once: ‘do you consider yourself a senior citizen?’ I said ‘no, I don’t have time.’”
Mosely says this is her third career, but only if you don’t count raising five children by herself before she married her husband in 1977. She worked as a surgery nurse in Texas while her husband taught microbiology at Texas Tech. They moved to Monroe, Oregon, when he retired in 1981. Shirley worked as a nurse again in Eugene, and then ran an antique shop in Monroe for more than 12 years before shutting it down to go to the culinary institute in Portland. The bakery is in the same building that used to house the antique shop.