Marilyn Matthews

MARILYN L. (BUTLER) MATTHEWS

Iowa City

Marilyn L. (Butler) Matthews passed away June 30, 2020, at Mercy Iowa City from a stroke. Marilyn had been a resident of Iowa City for 60 years and spent the last six months of her life at Pioneer Village in Lone Tree, Iowa.

Marilyn was born Feb. 6, 1935, in Monmouth, Ill., and was the second child of Arthur H. Butler and Lela M. (Allaman) Butler. Marilyn's youth was spent on the Butler farm just east of Monmouth. Her education started in a one-room country schoolhouse, which continued through eighth grade. She graduated from Monmouth High School in 1953 and that fall started a three-year education program for nursing at Methodist Hospital in Peoria, Ill. Upon graduation from nursing school, Marilyn worked as a nurse in Methodist Hospital and then at Denver General Hospital in Denver, Colo., before arriving in Iowa City. She worked as an RN at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics on and off for the next 45 years. She met her future husband, Evan C. Matthews, at a Christmas party in 1964. They were married Dec. 18, 1965, at the United Methodist Church in Monmouth, Ill.

Over the next 55 years of marriage, Marilyn devoted herself to her family and friends. She took time off from nursing to help her husband run his construction company, raise her children and enjoy her passions of travel and cooking through the 1970s and early 1980s. She returned to the University of Iowa Hospital as an RN in the mid-1980s and continued to nurse the ill until her retirement in 2005. Marilyn loved helping people.

Upon her retirement, she wrote that her most rewarding experience in nursing was knowing when she went home from work at the end of each shift she had helped someone that day on the road to recovery.

Marilyn is survived and lovingly remembered by her husband, Evan; her daughter, Patty (Matthews) Ferrel; son-in-law, Bill Ferrel; son, William A. Matthews;, daughter-in-law, Hildegarde Heymann; grandson, Evan J. Ferrel; granddaughter, Mary Margret (Maggie) McClelen and Maggie's husband, Michael McClelen; along with numerous extended family members.

She was preceded in death by her parents; her brother, Howard A. Butler; and her sister, Floyetta (Butler) Rolighed.

Marilyn's family are all extremely saddened by the loss but comforted by the thought that she is now free of the earthly handicaps that limited her mobility in the last decade of her life and can fly with the angels in heaven.

Because of COVID-19, there is no public service at this time. For those wishing to honor Marilyn, donations may be made to the University of Iowa Pediatric Chaplains.