ELSIE J. DEARING

LAMAR- Services will be held at 2 p.m. Tuesday at Konantz Warden Funeral Home for Elsie Juanita Dearing, 91, Lamar, who died Friday, July 13, 2018, at Truman Healthcare. Pastors Robb Hodson and Mike Gage officiated. Burial was in Memory Gardens Cemetery.

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

The obituary may be viewed and condolences sent online at www.konantzwarden.com.

Survivors include a daughter, Pam Caruthers and husband David, Lamar; a son, Dean Dearing and wife Cindy, Chattanooga, Tenn.; five grandchildren, Kristen Bishop and husband Kent, Lamar, Brice Caruthers and wife Kristi, Grain Valley, Brenton Caruthers and wife Rachel, Kansas City, Megan Dearing, Chattanooga, Tenn. and Matthew Dearing, New York City; three great-grandchildren, Emily Bishop, J.D. Bishop and Trey Caruthers, as well as her brother, Carroll Metzinger, Granite Bay, Calif. and a sister, Mary Hecox, Pomona, Calif.

She was preceded in death by her brother, Frank Metzinger and sister, Nancy Thexton.

Mrs. Dearing was born Aug. 19, 1926, in Hawkerville, Okla., to Clyde Raymond and Carrie Matilda (Arner) Metzinger. The family moved to El Monte, Calif. during the depression. She and her brother, Carroll, lived with their grandparents, Frank and Sarah Arner, to help out on the farm in Oakton for a time while in elementary school, where she attended Rocky Mound. She graduated from eighth grade in El Monte.

She moved to Lamar in 1950 and lived with her aunt and uncle, Frances and Bill Burch, where she met the love of her life, Sterling Dearing. They were married Aug. 19, 1951, in Harrisonville, Ark. He died in 1995. She was a housekeeper at the old Barton County Hospital, a stay at home mom until her children started school and then worked in the Lamar School cafeteria for about 20 years. She retired in 1976 to stay home and care for her grandchildren. She loved to work in her yard, crochet and embroider.