Dessie Downs, 91, died Monday, July 11, 2011, at the home of her daughter in Arkansas City.
She was born April 28,1920, to Samuel and Lora Brooks Gregg.
In October 1937, she married Virgil Linthicum in Iola. They divorced. She later married Joseph Vernum and moved to California where she was employed as a nurse in veterans hospitals in the Los Angles area. After Vernum’s death she moved to Fayetteville, Ark., and worked in a veterans hospital.
She then married Melvin Downs and later moved to Oklahoma. He died in 2006. She then went to live with her daughter, Linda, in Arkansas City.
She is survived by three daughters, Mary Jane Garver and Ginger Roush, both of Iola, and Linda Cyms, Arkansas City; two sons, Randy Linthicum, LaHarpe, and Sam Linthicum, Sommerville, Ala.; 13 grandchildren; and numerous great- and great-great-grandchildren.
She was preceded in death four brothers and three sisters
Cremation has taken place.
Graveside service will be conducted by the Rev. Dave McGullion at 1 p.m. on Wednesday in Highland Cemetery.
Dessie Downs
