“Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal.”
Our beloved Mary Virginia Wolverton passed from this world on Monday, August 30, 2010 after suffering a heart attack in her home on Sunday, August 22. She would have been 87 on October 15. Mary Virginia was born in Vinson, Oklahoma in 1923, the sixth of eight children born to Mattie and Ernest Ownbey. Her early life in dustbowl western Oklahoma during the depression was not an easy one. Her mother became a widow when Mary Virginia was only three, but hard times only made the family stronger, and they all grew up with a strong work ethic and a love of family that carried them through dark days and brighter times.
Mary Virginia was known for her love of good literature and was particularly fond of poetry, and she shared that love with her children, grandchildren, and hundreds of high school and college students. When she read a poem like Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken to a classroom of normally raucous teenaged students, it was with such feeling and flair that all those present were enrapt in the moment and it wasn’t unusual to see their eyes fill with tears and hear sniffles peppering the silence. Because of her gift, those touched by her have been left with a love of beautifully woven language that they might otherwise have never known.
In her later years, Mary Virginia was always so happy to see her family, and never failed to tell them how very much she loved them and how special they were to her. The feeling was and is entirely mutual. She will be greatly missed.
Mary Virginia was preceded in death by her two beloved husbands, H. Quentin Owens who passed away in 1962 and Warren Wolverton, who left us in 2000. She is survived by her three children, Marianne Owens Determan, Craig Q. Owens, and Margaret Owens Floeter; her three grandchildren, Jeffery Luikes, Amanda Cox, and Michael Floeter; four great grandchildren, Cody Nelson, Brad Nelson, Katy Nelson, and Ethan Cox; and three sisters, Florence Hogan, Ernestine Craig, and Imogene Williams. A memorial service will be held at Becker Funeral Home in Lawton on Thursday, September 2, 2010 at 1:30pm. Please join us to give thanks for Mary Virginia’s life.
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