Marilyn “Kay” Ringer, 58, of The Dalles, a former Baker City resident, died Feb. 15, 2002, at Mid-Columbia Medical Center.
Her funeral was today at The Dalles Zion Lutheran Church. Private cremation was at The Dalles Win-quatt Crematory. Inurnment was at The Dalles Odd Fellows Memorial Mausoleum.
Kay was born on Aug. 3, 1943, at Moscow, Idaho, to Sherman Duane “Bud” and Ellen Josephine Olsen Town. She grew up at Moscow and Baker City and was a 1961 Baker High School graduate. She attended the University of Oregon at Eugene for a year before transferring to Eastern Oregon College (now Eastern Oregon University) at La Grande.
She married Robert Allen Ringer on June 23, 1962, and they attended Eastern Oregon until Bob transferred to Blue Mountain Community College at Pendleton in 1963.
Kay worked at the Oregon Bank and after Bob’s graduation, he started with the First National Bank. They moved to The Dalles in 1975. She became a full-time homemaker and then in 1977, she and Bob started Ringer’s Texaco, with Kay as a partner and bookkeeper.
In 1987, she returned to Eastern and graduated in 1989 with a bachelor’s degree in education and a minor in bilingual education. In 1990, she started teaching at Colonel Wright Grade School and was teaching second grade at the time of her death.
Kay was a member of the United Church of Christ Congregational, the teachers association and was actively involved in the New Baldridge Education Reform Program. She enjoyed gardening, traveling, her family and grandchildren and her teaching.
Survivors include her husband, Robert A. “Bob” Ringer; her sons and their wives, Jeffrey and Roxanne Ringer and Jai and Kristen Ringer, all of The Dalles; grandchildren, Kayla of Fallon, Nev., and Jacob, Avery, Clayton and Autumn, all of The Dalles; her father and his wife, Sherman “Bud” and Ellen Town of Vale; her siblings, Sandy Lytle of Moscow, Idaho, Doug Town of Beaverton, Kathy Blackburn of Boise, Duane Town of Eagle, Idaho, and Betty Duncan of Unity; and numerous nieces, nephews and one great-niece.
She was preceded in death by her mother, Ellen Josephine.
Memorial contributions may be made to Reading Is Fundamental (a book for every child) through the Colonel Wright School, 610 W. 14th St., The Dalles, OR 97058.
Used with permission from: Baker City Herald, Baker City, Oregon, February 22, 2002
Transcribed by: Belva Ticknor