Velma Warbasse

VELMA WARBASSE

Central City

Velma Arlene Warbasse, 94, of Central City, died in the early morning hours of Friday, Nov. 13, 2015, at the Willow Gardens care facility in Marion. Friends and former students may attend a visitation from 4 to 7 p.m. Monday, Nov. 16, at Murdoch Funeral Home in Central City. Funeral services will be 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 17, at Jordan's Grove Church in rural Central City, followed by interment in Jordan's Grove Cemetery.

Velma was a lifelong member of Jordan's Grove Church and served that church in many capacities during her adult years.

Velma is survived by her son, Steven of rural Central City; her four grandchildren, Lisa Winkie (Eric) of Marion, Wendy Holtorff (John) of San Antonio, Texas, Matthew Warbasse (Jaimee) of Cedar Rapids and Sarah Mersch (Chuck) of Cedar Rapids; her 13 great-grandchildren; and one great-great-grandchild. Velma was an extraor-dinary mother and grandmother.

She also is survived by her sister-in-law, Margaret (Enabnit) Scott of Marion, the widow of her brother, Lyle.

Velma was born to Henry Scott and Clara (Batcheler) Scott on Sept. 9, 1921, on their farm near Central City. She graduated from Central City High School in 1938, valedictorian of her class at the age of 16. She then attended Iowa State Teachers College, where she obtained her rural school teaching certification after one year.

She commenced her teaching career at age 19 at Pleasant Valley Country School, where she taught for four years. Thereafter, she taught in Central City Elementary School and Central City High School from the 1940s through the early 1960s, all the while taking further college courses in the summers. During those years she taught in a wide variety of subjects and – in one or another academic year – at every elementary, junior high and high school grade level except kindergarten.

In the early 1960s, Velma took a leave of absence from teaching and attended the University of Iowa full time, ultimately obtaining her Bachelor of Arts degree in elementary education and her master's degree in elementary education and special education supervision. She then taught special education classes at Central City Elementary School and North-Linn Elementary School. During the last eight years of her career, Velma served as a special education consultant and assistant special education supervisor at Grant Wood Area Education Agency, working with other teachers in the Cedar Rapids area and Benton County.

Velma devoted 33 years of her life to teaching, not counting those years she devoted to full-time study of the profession. She received awards and recognition from various educational groups too numerous to mention, awards and recognition that were far less important to her than were her students.

She is remembered by many of her students for her natural ability to maintain an orderly classroom in which learning could take place, an orderliness that she maintained with her care, love and respect for them regardless of their levels of ability.

During her retirement years she greatly enjoyed encounters with her former students and attended many of those students' class reunions. Whenever she reminisced about her teaching career, she invariably concluded by saying, "I just loved those kids!"

Velma was preceded in death by her high school classmate, beloved husband of 66 years, Kenneth W. Warbasse, the class cutup who was quick to admit that his academic performance had been somewhat inferior to hers; her parents, of course, Henry and Clara; her brothers, Lloyd, Lyle and Leonard, who died in childhood; and her sister, Fleda Waldemer (Gilbert).

Now, Velma, too, has passed on, but she is most certainly not forgotten.