COEUR d’ALENE — As the daughter of an owner of a major car dealership, Eve Knudtsen spent a lot of time riding around in shiny new Chevys. But that wasn’t always the case.

She and her younger brother, Eric, would either walk or pedal two-wheelers from the top of the relatively steep Stanley Hill to school and all over Coeur d’Alene.

They rode their bikes to piano lessons, to the Rotary tennis courts at McEuen Field, and to a former Taco Time on Sherman Avenue before heading to the Wilma Theater for a Saturday matinee. And then there were Woolworth's and JC Penney on Sherman calling her name.

“We rode our bikes everywhere,” she said. “We didn’t have cellphones in those days, so we’d leave home in the morning and we’d be gone all day. Nobody worried. Everybody knew us anyway.”

There was also the lure of Lake Coeur d’Alene for the Knudtsen family.

“We had a boat all my life,” she said. “On Sunday mornings Mom would take my brother and me to church and Dad would go golfing. We’d come home, she’d pack up dinner and we’d take it down to the boat. We’d go to Eddyville or Arrow Point.”

The early years were heavenly, said the intense but engaging 54-year-old mother of two and owner and president of Knudtsen Chevrolet in Post Falls. However, high school was a much different story.

“I had friends, but when I look back on it now I didn’t have so much fun while I was there,” she said.

The teachers at Coeur d’Alene High School were good, she said, but the classes and curriculum were irrelevant as far as contributing to her future.

“I fell in trouble in high school mostly because I was bored. I wasn’t really challenged in school, so I became a challenge,” Knudtsen said.

She said the disappointing high school experience left her with a long-term motivation. She has gone from being a classroom challenge to a passionate champion of public education, from literacy among elementary students to establishing a career path for older students.

“I got so engaged with the idea of advanced learning — of having a professional/technical high school,” she said.

Knudtsen played a key role in creating the Kootenai Technical Education Campus in Rathdrum.

She graduated from CHS in 1980 and also struggled in college. She briefly attended North Idaho College and the University of Idaho, then Kinman University in Spokane where she was planning a future in the travel industry.

“Then someone suggested the car business, and I said, ‘That’s me!’”

Knudtsen “finally landed” at age 20 at Northern Michigan University and earned a degree in automotive marketing. She had found her niche in a family business that had always been at her fingertips.

Knudtsen Chevrolet was established in 1939 on Fourth Street by her grandfather, Clifford, who moved the family from Canada. Her father, Wayne, was 12 at the time.

Wayne took over the dealership in 1955. Eve didn’t immediately jump into the business, but instead went to a tough automotive market — Culver City, Calif. — to prove herself to herself.

“I wanted to know that I just didn’t have to just rely on Dad, and I could do this myself,” she said.

Soon she would indeed do it herself in her hometown. Her parents left on a European tour and asked her to return to Coeur d’Alene to mind the shop.

She took over the business when her father retired in 1995. The dealership moved to Post Falls in 2002 in need of more space. Today, Knudtsen Chevrolet employs about 80 and she has no plans to slow down.

“I had a really clear retirement plan, and then I got excited about the business again,” she said. “So I’m not looking for an exit strategy now.”

Her second husband, Wayne Cofield, works for the dealership as business development manager as do her brother and her older daughter, Lauren, in human resources. And a niece has shown an interest in getting involved, all good reasons to remain at the helm.

So what does the owner of a car dealership drive? Her first car during high school was a Nova. She has since had a variety of Chevy products including Corvettes and Camaros, but now opts for a more practical Tahoe.

She said she still looks forward to reporting to work every day, but that wasn’t always the case.

During the recession of 2008-09, with car manufacturers in bankruptcy, Knudtsen was thinking of changing course.

“Those were the days that were dark and made me think, ‘What am I doing?’”

To assist a possible escape, she went back to school and earned a master's degree at Gonzaga University while daughter Lauren was attending there as well.

“The joke was we can both be students at the same school at the same time, but we can never be roommates,” she said.

Her post-graduate experience and an improving economy changed her outlook.

“I fell back in love with what I do and who I am and how I engage in the community,” she said. “Then my daughter decided to come into the business. It’s just been blessed ever since.”

She said her father has been her mentor who taught her the value of family and community.

“Toward the end of Dad’s days I’d go up to visit him at his house,” she said. “His office overlooked Lake Coeur d’Alene. He’d look out at the lake and he’d turn and look at me and say, ‘Coeur d’Alene has really been good to me.’

“I’d have to say the same thing. Coeur d’Alene has really been good to me too. It’s been really good to our family all of these years. And we’re going on 78 years.”