VIRGINIA HININGER

LAMAR- A celebration of her life will be held at 2 p.m. Friday, at Daniel Funeral Home for Virginia Abbie (Fry) Hininger, 90, a life-long Barton County resident who died Saturday, March 19, 2022, after a long illness and residence at Truman Healthcare and Rehabilitation in Lamar. Interment will follow at Oak Grove Cemetery in Oakton.

Visitation will be held prior to the service, beginning at 1 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, contributions in her honor may be made to the Oak Grove Cemetery Fund or the Lamar Animal Shelter.

The obituary may be viewed at www.dfhlamar.com.

Survivors include her son, Danny Hininger and wife Patty, Lamar; her daughter, Lisa Friedemann and husband Mike, Lamar; her sister, Carolyn Ettleman and husband Fred, Rye, Colo.; three grandchildren, Margie Bowman, Lamar, Elizabeth Hininger, Joplin and Andrea Martin and husband Donny, Seneca; nine great-grandchildren, three great-great grandchildren and several cousins, nieces and nephews.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Earl Hininger; four brothers, Carl, Steve, Bill and Frank Fry and her only grandson, Lewis Hininger.

Mrs. Hininger was born Nov. 2, 1931, the second of six children born to Alfred and Clara (Stephens) Fry, in a tenant farmhouse east of Lamar at the height of the Great Depression. During her youth she worked alongside her father and brothers in the fields and barns, tending to crops and animals. She attended various rural one-room schools and graduated from Lamar High School in 1949.

She married the love of her life, Earl M. Hininger, on April 15, 1951, at Oakton Methodist Church. They raised their two children and worked and expanded their farm together until his untimely death in 1969. She continued to farm with her son full-time until 1984 and raised Hereford cattle for several more years. It was rare at that time for a woman to run a farming operation. In semi-retirement she worked part-time at the Barton County Health Department.

Her unwavering faith in God, her personal relationship with the Lord and the comfort of the Holy Spirit and biblical scripture carried her through life’s challenges and sorrows, always looking forward to the promise of eternal life through Jesus Christ her Savior. Along the path of her Christian journey she was active in the Oakton United Methodist Church, United Methodist Women, bible study groups and Women’s Aglow Fellowship.

In her retirement years she enjoyed tending and sharing the bounty of her large vegetable garden, baking, especially homemade rolls and pies, listening to gospel music and the companionship of her Australian Shepherd dogs and several barn cats throughout the years. She also enjoyed traveling, especially her annual Fall trips to visit her sister’s family in Colorado and witness the beauty of the Fall foliage of the aspen trees in the Rocky Mountains.