Mary Olean Strickland

Services for Mary Olean Rogers (Strickland) will be 1:00 p.m., Friday, May 2, 2014 at MMS-Payne Funeral Home Chapel, Claremore; burial will follow at Bower Cemetery, Eufaula, Oklahoma. Friends may visit at the funeral home on Thursday, May 1, from 1—8p.m., with family receiving visitors from 6—8p.m. Mary passed away on Sunday, April 27, 2014 at the age of 79.

Mary Olean Shirley was born on January 2, 1935 in Bower, Oklahoma to Everett Raymond and Bernice Jewell (Jones) Shirley, Mary received her education in her birth community and graduated with the class of 1951. She met Thomas “T.J.” Rogers while living in Canadian and the two were married on February 17, 1952 in Rogers Arkansas, following his return from Japan and discharge from the U.S. Army. Mary Olean was a homemaker and baby sitter while her children were young. In order to support her children following her husband’s death, she began working for Nelson Electric in 1972. She was a faithful employee of Nelson Electric and retired with over twenty-five years of service. Mary Olean enjoyed being at her home. She enjoyed reading, working crossword puzzles, and spending time with her family, especially her great-grandchildren Josie and Grant.

A kind and caring mother, grandmother and sister, Mary Olean is survived by her family which include her daughter Karen Geiger and husband Ed of Chelsea; her grandchildren Angela Rhoten and husband Jason and Matt Geiger and wife Rebecca, all of Claremore; her great grandchildren Josie Rhoten and Grant Geiger; siblings Don Shirley and wife Grace of Ontario, California, Virginia Burns of Bixby, OK; and sister-in-law Rachel Shirley of Phoenix, Arizona. Mary was preceded in death by her parents, her husband T.J., her son Raymond “Pete” Rogers, brother Norman Shirley, and infant twin siblings, Royce and Joyce.