Alvena Bieri

Memorial services for Alvena Bieri, age 75, of Stillwater, OK are scheduled for 2:00 p.m. Wednesday, June 25, 2008 at Palmer Marler Carberry Funeral Home Chapel with Reverend Derrek Belase and Reverend Stan Warfield, Jr. officiating. Services are under the direction of Palmer Marler Carberry Funeral Home. Alvena Bieri was born during a snowstorm in Hobart on December 7th 1932. She was the first child of Alvin and Sallie Newell Brillhart, and the granddaughter of pioneers to the area what started farming there after the land lottery of 1901. She graduated from Hobart High School in 1950 as the Best All-round Girl, and she also received a prize as the best student in English. She went on to Oklahoma A&M for a year, then received an out of state scholarship to the University of Wisconsin at Madison where she graduated with high honors. After teaching ninth grade English at Guymon for a year, she came back to Stillwater on a graduate assistantship. She was married to Art Bieri in 1955, a marriage that lasted 24 years. After their divorce they remained on civil terms. Their children are Donna Bieri of Stillwater, and John who lives with his family in Olathe, Kansas. She is also survived by Johns wife Terri and two grandchildren whom she loved very much Josh and Avery. Her younger brother Jim continues to reside in Mountain View, OK and Art lives here in Stillwater. Alvena taught composition in the English Department at OSU about 14 years before resigning to become a full-time mother. Later she started writing brief pieces for the Oklahoma Observer, then a weekly book column for the Stillwater News Press and book reviews for the Progressive Populist. She also had a centennial column in the Perkins Journal and an occasional review in The Chronicles of Oklahoma, the publication of the Oklahoma Historical Society. She was the author of Romancing Oklahoma, a book about growing up in Hobart. For many years she was the part-time custodian at Highland Park United Methodist Church, a job she described as just good clean fun. She also worked part-time for several years as the Outreach worker for the Stillwater Elderly Nutrition Site and at DHS. She was active in progressive movements around Stillwater in the 1980s and helped write and edit a small publication, Waging Peace. Alvena passed from this life to be with her Lord and Savior on June 20, 2008 in Stillwater, OK. Send memorial gifts to the Peace House 2912 N. Robinson Oklahoma City, OK 73103 or Habitat for Humanity in Stillwater. Condolences may be sent using our online guestbook at www.pmcfh.com.