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Major Carol Edith Ganot was promoted to Glory Dec. 1 from Waimea, Hawaii.
Carol Edith Ratcliff was born Jan. 1, 1932, in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, to Lyman and Edith Ratcliff. Living in Alberta with her parents and five siblings until age 9 or 10, the family moved to a farm outside the city without running water, indoor plumbing or electric power. Working as a telephone operator after high school, she was introduced to The Salvation Army. Carol later attended the training college in Toronto, and was commissioned with the Pioneers Session at age 21.
At age 27, she accepted her first missionary assignment in the Bahamas, West Indies. Ratcliff eventually opened a school for visually impaired children, which still operates today.
Carol eventually joined the training college staff in Kingston, Jamaica, mentoring many cadets. She moved Fond de Negres, Haiti, for nine years. While there, she resigned her commission to marry Frenchman Lucien Ganot, but continued as a soldier in The Salvation Army. The Ganots fulfilled their mutual dream in the ‘70s when they built a school and clinic in the Haitian countryside. The structure withstood the 2010 earthquake, serving as a shelter and medical station.
In 1981, the couple adopted a baby girl, Elizabeth, from Guatemala. Shortly after, her husband suffered a fatal heart attack. Carol then adopted a second daughter, Violette, from the children’s home where she had worked, and the three returned to Canada.
Returning to The Salvation Army, Carol served briefly in El Paso, Texas, before moving to Henderson, Nev., where she opened an adult day care center. In 1988, she returned to the Caribbean to serve six years as divisional commander of Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada and St. Vincent. She worked with a team supporting drug and alcohol rehabilitation centers, shelters for abused women and food distribution centers.
In 1995, Carol made her final move to Waimea. She started an after-school skateboard program, pursued efforts to build and open a skate park and opened a thrift store and food bank, which closed after her retirement.
New Hope Church hosted a Celebration of Life service Dec. 8 with Major Angie Sholin presiding.
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I knew and visited Carol Ganot when she was the Salvation Army administrator of what appeared to be one of the only complex of community services in the village of Fond des Negres, Haiti. This included elementary and secondary schools with lunch program, hiring of local women to cook and to make uniforms for the schools, and a sanitarium/hospital. She reached to outside organizations, such as Save the Children, and to individuals for financial support of individual children for health and schooling. I was so impressed with the work being done in this isolated place with few resources that I purchased an encyclopedia in French for their small library.