Pearl Clem — A local icon

There are some people that you liken to “diamonds in the rough” or other types of jewels, but a “Pearl” is beyond price.

Pearl Clem, has worked at various State Farm agents since 1956, and is a beloved and highly esteemed member of the Porterville community.

“You treat people like you want to be treated,” says Clem, about all her years working for State Farm.

Her daughter, Nanette Madding, recalls, “I grew up in the State Farm Office on Olive Street. Mom would often bring ‘throw away’ paperwork home for Jeanette and I to ‘play office, when we were 5 and 6 years old. We had fun, and felt very grown up. During Christmas and summer vacations we often went to work with Mom and were taught to file and answer phones.  Before work we would go to Mark and Mary Sharp’s home, and Grandma Sharp would fix us a breakfast of biscuits and gravy, or eggs and toast. We loved going to work with Mom!”

Pearl Clem was born in Pine City, Minn., where her parents had a farm. When Pearl was 11-years-old, her family moved to Malin, Ore., a small town near Klamath Falls, near the California border. Pearl says her mother worked in a restaurant while her father worked for a grain company. Clem says she met a man from Porterville and married him, and left her family and moved to Porterville in 1952.

Clem’s daughter Nanette, was born in 1956, and her daughter Janette, in 1958. “Nanette was 8-months-old when I started working for State Farm and Mike and Mary Sharp,” says Clem, “Where, I made copies, took care of the files, helped customers make their claims, and wrote up new business for our customers.”

I worked for Mike and Mary Sharp until they retired in 1997. “There was only one State Farm office in Porterville then, and the Sharps were very well known and liked.”

Clem was a very dear friend of the Sharps, according to Rita Doriack, and treated them much like her parents. She took care of them until they passed away.

“I brought up two daughters on my own, without utilizing welfare, food stamps, or child support, because it wasn’t the thing in those days,” says Clem, “not like now.”

“Pearl is a great mother, and she has a wonderful rapport with her daughters, Nannette and Jeanette” says Doriack, “who both worship their mother.” She also says that Clem has had a lot of struggles in her life, and that after she married her husband, John Clem, her life changed for the better. They joke and laugh, and have a wonderful relationship. Pearl is always smiling, no matter what the circumstances, and is a real trooper. She can’t do enough for people.

Both of Clems daughters have worked for the Department of Corrections, and her oldest daughter, Nanette Manning, was honored with the Volunteer of the Year Award in Paso Robles. Her youngest daughter, Janette, lives in Hanford.

“I like working with the people,” says Clem, “and that is what I miss now that I’m retired, I miss that constant action.”

After working with the Sharps, Clem went to work for another State Farm Agent, David Leming, and worked there for almost 20 years.

Doriack says she started working with Clem in about 1984, at David Leming’s State Farm office, where all their clients loved Pearl. “Pearl has a great sense of humor, and is a wonderful person. When she left Lemings office about 1989, and went to work for Steve Armendarez, Carmen Becerra and I kept in close contact with Pearl.”

Clem says she worked with Steve Amendarez, at State Farm for 12 and half years, “until January 2010, when my husband, John, got sick.”

The Clem’s have been married for 33 years, and Pearl says, “I was single for so many years, that when we got married, it was quite a change. John has been working for various trucking companies his whole life, and worked for his brother-in-law, Dean West, trucking in Porterville. John retired due to his health.”

Deanna Vasquez, Steve Amendarez’s sister, fondly recalled memories of Clem, and said, “Pearl is an icon here in town. She knows everyone. And she knows everything about State Farm, and the insurance business.”

“Pearl is a person whom I like, respect and admire. She is not only a person that I work with but also my neighbor as well.  Pearl and John were some of the first people my family and I met when we moved to Porterville in 1974,” says Steven Armendarez.

“To this day, I feel I was extremely fortunate when Pearl walked into my office. For me, hiring Pearl was a no-brainer. Working with her was even easier. When I told my staff, Barbara McKelvy and Irma, my wife, that Pearl would be working with us, their immediate response was ‘What are you waiting for!’"

“My daughter, Lisa, would help out at the office after high school. One day she told of a stressful situation that occurred in the office, and explained how Pearl defused the problem and took care of our client. My daughter summed it up simply stating ‘Pearl is cool.’ I believe that too.”