Graveside services for Margaret Louise (Owen) King Wesner, 98, of Chickasha will be held at 11:00 a.m. on Friday, January 20, 2017 in the Goodland Cemetery in Goodland, Kansas.
Margaret Louise Owen was born on October 14, 1918 in Edson, Kansas to John P. and Louie (Evans) Owen. She died on January 12, 2017 in Chickasha, Oklahoma.
After graduating as Valedictorian from Edson Consolidated School, Margaret attended Kansas State University receiving her Bachelor’s Degree in Home Economics in 1940. She then attended Ohio University and received her Master’s in Home Economics with a teaching fellowship in 1942. Margaret later attended SWOSU in Weatherford, Oklahoma and attained her Master’s in Education in 1959.
Margaret married Otis M. King in Denton, Texas in 1946. They lived in Lawrence, Kansas for two years while Otis obtained his M.S. in Biology at KU. Margaret spent a year teaching at Country Estates School in Midwest City, Oklahoma while Otis did graduate work on the OU campus. They then moved to Weatherford, Oklahoma where she taught kindergarten during her husband’s tenure as Professor of Biology at SWOSU. When Otis King died suddenly in 1959, Margaret left Weatherford. After one year as Director of Laboratory Kindergarten at North Texas State University, she returned to Oklahoma.
Throughout her lifetime Margaret worked as the Director of Childhood Education at NWSU of Louisiana in Natchitoches, Director of Laboratory Kindergarten at North Texas State University in Denton, Texas, and Instructor of Childhood Education at SWOSU in Weatherford, Oklahoma. She also worked for Alfalfa Public Schools for one year as a first grade teacher and then as a first grade and kindergarten teacher for Tulsa Public Schools. Margaret taught for a total of 23 years at various Tulsa Public Schools including Emerson, Kendall, Sequoyah and McKinley, retiring in 1983. She was very active during her retirement, volunteering at St. Francis Hospital and the Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa.
In 1987 she married Leon Wesner, who retired from Central & Southwest Corporation. They enjoyed several years of travel, volunteer work and civic life in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Margaret was a 60 year member of the American Association of University Women and PEO Sisterhood Chapter CC. as well as a long time member of the Tulsa Opera Guild, Tulsa Retired Educators, and First United Methodist Church, Joynor Sunday School Class.
She enjoyed reading, cooking, entertaining, and family pictures. She also loved to travel, cultivate roses, and attend art exhibitions.
Margaret was preceded in death by both parents, and husbands, Otis M. King and Leon Wesner, as well as sisters, Lucille (Owen) Staadt and husband Harold, of Tulsa, Patricia (Owen) Lohr and husband Melvin, of Goodland, Kansas, and sister-in-law Mary Alice Owen (wife of Larry Owen).
Survivors include her brother, Larry Owen, of Wichita, Kansas; nieces and nephews and their spouses, Randy and Elsa Staadt, Neil Staadt, Gwen (Lohr) and Alan Stormont; Kevin and Barb Lohr, Brad and Cassi Lohr, Curtis Owen, several great nieces and nephews, stepson-in-law Gary Badgett, and his wife, Charlotte, of Chickasha; step-granddaughter Julie Badgett Sinn and her husband, Tim, and their children Andrew and Luke; and other extended family and friends.
A viewing will be held from 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. on Thursday, January 19, 2017 at the Bateman Funeral Home in Goodland, Kansas.
Services are under the direction of Ferguson Funeral Home.