Rhoda (Fulton) Riddell was born in Japan on October 28, 1920 to Robert and Karen Fulton, marking the start of an adventurous life.

Her parents left Japan after the Great Kanto earthquake of 1923 and eventually settled in La Jolla. Rhoda graduated from La Jolla High in 1938 and then waited tables at her mother’s local restaurant “Fulton’s Green Dragon Inn.” She also did some modeling and briefly attending UC Berkeley and secretarial school. Rhoda met an enlisted man in La Jolla and they went to Hawaii to be married - two weeks before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Rhoda told how she and her husband Robert were in bed when the Japanese attacked and how the Japanese were shooting at their get-away car. When the couple later divorced, Rhoda decided to travel the world with her two daughters, Laurie and Cecily. Rhoda lived in nine countries and worked as a foreign war correspondent, had a radio show for armed forces, was a realtor in La Jolla and a travel writer and social director aboard a cruise ship in the Mediterranean. She loved to read’ was a member of the Mensa Society and founding mother of the San Diego Writers Guild. Rhoda lived in Borrego Springs for about fifteen years and passed away after complications from a fall.

Rhoda was known for her wit, and according to a close friend, was cheerful, funny and authentic. Interestingly, she ended her stay on Friday the 13th. Mrs. Riddell lived in Borrego Springs for about fifteen years and had a remarkable life.