June N. Wilson

June Naomi Wilson (Turner) passed away on February 26, 2024 in her home of 58 years in Windsor Heights, Iowa, after a four-year battle with Alzheimer's disease. Fortunately for her family she recognized and greeted us even to the end of this horrific disease and we were able to make sure she knew how much we loved and cherished her.

June was born February 3, 1929 in Republic, Ohio. The youngest of four children, and the daughter of two busy ministers, she moved often and lived in many small towns growing up. Often alone, she was quiet and turned inward, finding solace in reading, writing and in poetry which became a lifetime passion. When she was 20 years old and decided to go to Findley College, her parents could not afford to pay for the dorm so the whole family moved to Findley so she could live at home and attend classes. In 1949 during her sophomore year, she met fellow student Russell Wilson. They dated and on September 4 of that year, were married in Fort Scott, Kansas. This year they have been married for 75 years. Recently when asked what the secret was to that many years of marriage, Russ answered “Marry the right person.” He certainly did.

June and Russ began their life in Enid, Oklahoma where Russ attended college. He became a minister so they moved often, living in many Iowa towns — Shambaugh, Ida Grove, Edgewood, Clinton, Waterloo, and State Center—before settling in Windsor Heights in 1966.

June was a mother. Her first career as she referred to it, was raising her four children. She loved being pregnant. She loved having her children. They never went without things they needed. Often, she went without so that they could have music lessons, a new dress or buy a birthday present for a friend.

She cooked three meals a day for them every day of her family life. She made the most beautiful Christmas sugar cookies, coconut bunny cakes, the world’s best German chocolate cake and magic apricot balls.

She prepared for and packed everything needed for family camping trips every summer for as many years as her kids can remember—even for a 10-day family canoe trip in the Boundary Waters, down to the M&Ms for the late-night sugar munchies she somehow anticipated!

June was a student and a teacher. After raising her children, she returned to college at Drake University in Des Moines. She excelled in school and loved learning, a member of Kappa Delta Pi Honor Society in Education. She worked at Plymouth Nursery School, The American Lung Association, and the American Heart Association. She received awards for her volunteer work for Aging Resources of Central Iowa in Des Moines. In 1977 she and Russ moved to Sioux City when Russ took a job in development at Morningside College. While there she completed her BA degree at Morningside at age 50 in Early Childhood Education while also volunteering at the Native American Childcare Center at Grace United Methodist Church on the college campus.

June loved children. She loved teaching them and being with them. From 1981–1989 she taught preschool at the Morningside Childcare Center, serving as a cooperating teacher for early childhood majors and working with the Western Hills Area Education Agency to mainstream preschoolers with special needs into the preschool. She served as a member of the Sioux City Community School District’s Minority Advisory Council.

Returning to Des Moines in 1989 to live in their home in Windsor Heights, June joined the staff of Cowles Childcare Center and later taught at the West Des Moines United Methodist Church Preschool. She was a member of the National Association for the Education of Young Children and led workshops for them in Iowa and Nebraska. Her biggest sadness was having her grandchildren grow up and no longer want to spend hours on the living room floor playing Chinese checkers, and it often brought her to tears.

June was a wife. She loved Russ and the life they created together. The daughter of two ministers, June was a loving and supportive partner, filling the unique shoes of also becoming a minister’s wife. Her daughters knew it was challenging and while writing this obituary, they found an actual list of expectations of being a minister’s wife and it brought clarity to the challenges she faced and how successfully she rose to meet them. The list included: She should be a good housekeeper. She should be a good hostess, able to prepare a meal at short notice. She must be an early riser—and go-to-bed laterer. She should attend all church functions, always being on time. She should dress well, but not too stylishly. She should live within her budget. She must be able to keep secrets. Her children should always do and say the right things. She filled these big shoes with grace. Her children, not so much!

In the 1970s she and Russ, were trained to lead Marriage Enrichment Weekends, and later they designed and led Family Enrichment Experiences which they copyrighted and turned over to Marriage Enrichment, Inc. She was proud of that accomplishment and learned many things about herself that bolstered her self-esteem during those experiences.

The two of them spent hours together planting and nurturing gardens, building wooden canoes and other woodworking projects, and helping their kids move once again or help them finish a multitude of projects.

Together they were a force for good, helping too many people to mention by volunteering, donating money, gathering clothes and food for those in need, and taking in students or friends who needed a place to live. It seemed they were always helping someone.

June was an artist. She sewed prom dresses for her daughters and their friends. At age 70 she joined the Des Moines Quilt Guild, invited by her dear friend, Connie Gilmore, where she made many beautiful quilts and many friends. She loved to watercolor and was so happy with a brush in her hand. She always had a craft project and all the supplies ready for any child who entered their home. She made greeting cards and never missed sending them no matter the holiday or for no reason at all other than to say “I love you.”

June loved flowers and created lovely flower gardens. She loved to collect and dry flowers and make tiny framed pieces with them. She loved music and enjoyed singing in choirs beginning in high school. She created beautiful tables for holiday family gatherings and always had the table set the night before, a gene her daughters wish they would have inherited.

June loved words and poetry. She loved reading poetry, especially Ralph Waldo Emerson and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She collected it and she wrote it. As her family has sorted through papers they have discovered many small scraps of paper with beautiful poems written on them, most of which her family had never seen. She kept diaries and wrote stories about family vacations and always sent a Christmas letter. Her beautiful handwriting is etched into the memories of those who were the lucky recipients of her cards, letters and the Turner family round-robins.

June is survived by her husband of 75 years, Russell; their children, Connie (son Max), Bruce (daughter, Avalan), Clarice (daughter Kevalin, husband Gerald, and their baby on the way) and Kristin (son Chess, daughter, Madison and husband, Alden and great granddaughters, Riley and Zelda); her sister-in-law and friend, Jeanette and her extended family in Kansas City; her nieces and nephews, Dean Hiser (Nancy), Rick Hiser (Linda), Dan Turner (Coretta), Steve Turner (Diana), David Turner (Carrie), Sharon McDaniel (Gary), Mickie Schmalz (Ed), Kathy Abrahamse (Bill), Ron Kinley (Alice) and many lovely great nieces and nephews all of whom she loved getting to know at family reunions in her later years. She is also survived by one of the best girlfriends she ever had, Connie Gilmore, and was so grateful for the times they shared.

She was preceded in death by her parents, Frank and Ruth Turner; her brother John Turner and his wife Rosalind who was June’s best friend from grade school, and their son, Mark; her sister Beth (husband Jean and their daughter Cheri); sister Beulah (husband Eskil); and by her mother-in-law, Ina Wilson, who she loved and cared for, for many years until she died at age 100.

June was buried on February 28 in the Des Moines Masonic Cemetery under an old oak tree surrounded by her family, friends and the entire Hospice of the Midwest team who has been lovingly taking care of her for many months. The family extends their heartfelt love and appreciation to these incredible hospice folks for their loving care of June and their support for her family, and to Kerry, Roni, Janelle, Jenny and Stacie who have been such a constant, helpful presence in their home during her illness.

For all of us who knew her, loved her and will miss her so much, she leaves the legacy of a lovely, gracious woman and an example of kindness and generosity for all of us to follow. May her soul soar and may all of you who were lucky enough to know her, know that she would want you to stop to smell the flowers, be happy, and be kind to each other to honor her life.
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Her wishes for her funeral, which she wrote out in painstaking detail, were honored at her graveside service so there will be no further funeral service. For those of you who would have liked to attend, we are sorry, and share the service that she helped create below.

Gifts in her honor may be sent to Families Forward, to support New Directions Shelter and Bidwell Riverside services for women and families, a cause she believed in and supported. https://www.familiesforward.org
Condolences may be expressed at www.HamiltonsFuneralHome.com


GRAVESIDE SERVICE
February 28, 2024 | 3 pm

JUNE WILSON
February 3, 1929 – February 26, 2024

Welcome and opening prayer by Rev. Dave Stout, longtime friend of Mom and Dad’s.

Thank you for coming out on this blustery day to celebrate June. We are all grieving the loss of a wife, of a sister, of a mother and grandmother, of an aunt, of a friend.

These will be difficult days for all of us. However, she would want us to celebrate her life and to continue to celebrate the lives we have with each other going forward.

Kristin Wilson

As many of you know, June loved words. She loved poetry. She collected it and she wrote it. As we have sorted through papers, we have found many of those words, which we are sharing in this service today. They give a deeper glimpse into the woman we all love and will miss so much.

I gave this to her as a teenager and it hung on the refrigerator for years until I took home this week.

God is Love

That God is Life is just as plain
as that the sunshine follows rain.

That God is Love is just as true
as that the grasses thrive on dew.

So let us wait and never doubt
that dew will fall when stars peep out,

And when the raindrops splash and run,
Let’s keep a lookout for the sun.

She loved music too.
Especially church music and this was one of her favorites based on Psalm 91

Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.”

On Eagle’s Wings

Connie Wilson

O Lord, O Thou Whose mercy hath encompassed all, Whose forgiveness is transcendent, Whose bounty is sublime, Whose pardon and generosity are all-embracing, and the lights of Whose forgiveness are diffused throughout the world! O Lord of Glory! I entreat Thee, fervently and tearfully, to cast upon Thy handmaiden who hath ascended unto Thee the glances of the eye of Thy mercy. Robe her in the mantle of Thy grace, bright with the ornaments of the celestial Paradise, and, sheltering her beneath the tree of Thy oneness, illumine her face with the lights of Thy mercy and compassion.

Bestow upon Thy heavenly handmaiden, O God, the holy fragrances born of the spirit of Thy forgiveness. Cause her to dwell in a blissful abode, heal her griefs with the balm of Thy reunion, and, in accordance with Thy will, grant her admission to Thy holy Paradise. Let the angels of Thy loving-kindness descend successively upon her, and shelter her beneath Thy blessed Tree. Thou art, verily, the Ever-Forgiving, the Most Generous, the All-Bountiful.

People were asked if they wanted to share.

Jeanette, Russ’s sister shared that Mom was her mentor...that she always wanted to be as good a mother as June was.

Connie

Although her soul has already soared, we now commend her body to her final resting place with God. June, we say to you in the midst of our sorrow and loss that we are grateful that you lived your life among us. We are grateful for your quiet gentleness and for your firm resolve to live life and to die on your own terms. We take joy and relief in knowing that your suffering has ended. We ask you now for forgiveness for any of the ways we may have hurt you in this life — and we forgive you for any of the ways you may have hurt us. We release you now into the arms of God. May your passage be swift. May you know Wholeness and Peace now and through all eternity.

Many of you here know me as a control freak...well, I come by it naturally. My mother wrote her own funeral and she even paid the pianist...so things included here today were all at her request.

In closing, she left some final words for those of us who are left behind. We found them stapled to the program she wrote for her funeral so she meant for them to be shared with each and every one of you today.

My body has come to the end of its purpose, but my soul shall never die. It will live through future’s summer warmth, autumn colors, winter snow, and spring’s glorious blooms—violets, daffodils, iris, hostas and lilies. It will shine in the morning sun or perhaps in the softly falling rain, noontime heat and evening sunsets. I will be there to guide you and continue my love for you. I will never leave you alone. Take my hand and we will walk together on life’s journey.

Go knowing how much she loved all of you and would want you to be kind to each other in these days.

Closing
She loved this song.
For the Beauty of the Earth

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