Rachel Elizabeth Wyse

September 23, 1923 - December 5, 2017

Rachel Elizabeth Wyse, 94, passed away on Tuesday, December 5, 2017, at Parkview Manor in Wellman.

Memorial services will be held at 10:00 a.m. Saturday, January 6, 2018, at Wayland Mennonite Church. In lieu of flowers, a memorial has been established for Mennonite Central Committee. Rachel's body has been deeded to the University of Iowa Department of Anatomy. Her family will be in charge of memorial service arrangements.

Rachel was born September 23, 1923, in rural Wayland, the daughter of Joseph and Barbra (Rich) Graber. She became a member of Sugar Creek Mennonite Church at the age of 11. Rachel graduated from Wayland high in 1940. She married Roger Wyse on August 7, 1949, at Wayland Mennonite Church. He preceded her in death on December 16, 2009.

The newlyweds settled in rural Wayland where Rachel taught at Douglas Country School, worked in a tax office, and had their five children. They relocated to Wellman from 1962-66 years, where she worked in the office of the Kalona Sale Barn. From there they moved to Bloomfield, where she taught preschool in their home for a number of years. Rachel went back to college when she was 54 years old to become an LPN, subsequently working at the Davis County Hospital until retiring in 1986.

She and Roger moved back to Wayland as their home-base between volunteer assignments over ten years in a number of states. After Roger became a resident at Wellman's Parkview Manor, Rachel moved to an adjoining Silver Pond Assisted Living apartment in order to be near him.

She enjoyed cooking, baking, sister days, gardening, reading, jigsaw puzzles, watching birds at her birdfeeders, taking morning walks, visits and phone calls from her children and grandchildren, rides through the country, and her annual birthday outing to gather hickory nuts in her father's home-place timber.

Rachel is survived by five children - Priscilla (Thomas) Clemens, Joseph Wyse, Jeffery (Sheila O'Neill) Wyse, Jerome (Lori) Wyse, and Ramona (Jim) Miller; six grandchildren - David and Alex Clemens, Roman and Sedona Wyse, Ainsley (Brandt) Brenneman, and Naomi Miller; and two sisters - Berniece Roth and Beulah Mae Swartzendruber.

She was preceded in death by her parents, husband, an infant daughter (Lisa Rae), four brothers - Raymond, Willis, Clarence and Virgil Graber, three sisters - Welma Nelson, Lois Swartzendruber, and Sara Lu Frederick, and sister-in-law Betty Farrier.