Submitted photo Bonnie Marks of Imnaha was recently recognized for 25 years of service as a 4-H leader.

Most people in Imnaha know Bonnie Marks as the postmaster of the Imnaha Post Office, but long before she became the full-time postmaster in 1993 Marks had embarked on a long career of community service. For the past 25 years, since 1977, she has volunteered her time to the youngsters of the Imnaha community as a 4-H leader.

For 17 years she, with some help from husband Don, led the community’s 4-H livestock club. Since that time, or sometimes doubling up with more than one club at a time, Marks has taught a leather craft club, sewing, ceramics and crafts. For the past several years she has been the leader of Imnaha’s 4-H community service club which focuses on record books, community service, fundraising and parliamentary procedure. As part of that volunteer effort she has acted as a coordinator for the 4-H project leaders in the tiny burg who teach photography, horse, fiber arts, livestock and even adventures for youngsters grades K thru 3. Marsha Svendsen of the extension office in Enterprise has jokingly told Marks that Imnaha is the only place where youngsters receive one-on-one teaching in some project areas.

Marks does not profess to have a favorite club she leads, instead says, “My favorite club is the one I am doing at the time. It is just fun seeing the progress the kids make in whatever they are doing.”

With club sizes ranging from six to 24, Marks has had the majority of Imnaha youngsters in one or more of her clubs since 1977.

As postmaster she says she knows all of some 250 people who get their mail through the Imnaha post office. Since 1977 she has seen the population of the city of Imnaha drop “from 26 to 12 or 14.”

Raised in Hermiston, Bonnie graduated from Hermiston High School in 1970, received a one-year secretarial degree from Blue Mountain Community College and was working at the Pendleton Grain Growers when Don Marks of Imnaha walked into her life. They married and she moved to Imnaha in 1974.

They have one daughter, Darla, a 1994 Joseph High School graduate who is a 4-H Extension agent for Teton County in Jackson, Wyo.

Bonnie Marks was introduced to 4-H at an early age, participating in cooking and sewing clubs when she was growing up in Hermiston. Now she appreciates the fact that a leader must spend preparation time before each meeting.

Last year Bonnie Marks was one of eight from Wallowa County who attended the Western Regional 4-H Leaders Forum in Great Falls, Mont. Still a relatively young 4-H leader at age 50, she hopes that the lessons she learned from those workshops will serve her and the Imnaha community for years to come.