Juanita Jean Burns Griffin

November 26, 2020

Juanita Jean Burns Griffin

Service Details

Juanita Jean (Burns) Griffin was born August 25, 1935, the youngest of four children born to Claude Elmer and Beulah (Cox) Burns at Centralia, Craig County, Oklahoma and passed away November 26, 2020 at Altoona Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Altoona, Polk County, Iowa. Juanita united in marriage with Russell Warren Griffin, February 27, 1974, at Las Vegas, Clark County, Nevada.

After graduating high school, Juanita, with sister Billie, moved to Des Moines where they resided with sister Lela and her husband Charles, providing daycare for niece Allice.

Before marriage, Juanita worked as a Nurse’s Aide for the Lutheran Home for the Aged and in later years operated an in home daycare. She absolutely loved children but never having any of her own played surrogate mother/grandmother to every child she met.

Juanita always dreamed of traveling and she and niece Allice planned to travel across the US, working jobs and moving from state to state. Marriage of both put an end to those plans, but Juanita got a small portion of that dream when she married Russell Griffin. They lived in several states, Louisiana, California, Kansas, Arkansas, and Iowa, and traveled to many more.

Juanita is survived by niece, Allice Reynolds (Mark), great niece Stephanie Reynolds, and great grand nephew Jackson Gridley.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Russell, parents and siblings Lela Burns, Billie Burns, and Julian James Burns.

Graveside services will be held December 10, 2020 at 10:30 a.m. with burial in Laurel Hill Cemetery, Des Moines, Iowa.

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