- Date Of Death: November 30, 2017
- State: Indiana
Marilyn Virginia Hillyard Yeager
Virginia Yeager passed away on November 30, 2017. She was born Marilyn Virginia Hillyard in Princeton, Indiana, to John Wheeler Hillyard and Cora Marie Montgomery Hillyard on December 22, 1928. During the Depression, Virginia’s parents were selected in a drawing to buy a farm through a New Deal program, and three generations of her extended family have now been raised there. For the rest of her life Virginia took great pride in her Princeton heritage and her extended Hillyard family. Later in life she delighted in a family genealogy revealing all manner of Hillyard, Montgomery, McCutchan and Wheeler characters back to Revolutionary times.
Virginia graduated from Princeton High School in 1946 and from Indiana University with a degree in Education in 1950. She treasured a summer internship in Indianapolis when she lived with her dear aunt Bertha Montgomery.
At IU Virginia met Joe Yeager, an Army Air Corps veteran. Virginia’s charm, beauty and erudition left Joe defenseless, and they married in 1952. They were deeply dedicated to each other for 63 years.
Virginia loved words, sentences, and books. She also loved sports of all types. After IU she taught high school English and Social Studies and coached girls’ sports at high schools in Stryker, Ohio and Washington, Indiana. After marriage Joe and Virginia moved to Greenwood and then to Perry Township, where Virginia taught English at Southport High School. She was a grammarian and committed sentence diagrammer. At Southport she met teachers and students who became lifelong friends.
She later taught at Perry East Junior High and at Meridian Middle School.
Virginia inspired her family and her friends with resilience, humility, warmth, dignity and wit. Her inner strength confounded generations of wonderful doctors, right up to the end of her life.
And, she was always impeccably dressed.
Virginia’s husband Joseph Heizer Yeager and brother James Robert Hillyard predeceased her. She leaves behind grateful children Joseph Heizer Yeager, Jr. (Candance Grass), John Hillyard Yeager (Barbara Yeager) and Joanne Yeager Dull (Dr. Christopher Dull) and beloved grandchildren Samuel Lloyd Yeager (Elizabeth Yeager), Henry Joseph Yeager, Daniel Watson Yeager, Bess Amelia Yeager, Christopher John Dull, Jr., and Hillyard Austin Dull. She also leaves cherished nieces and nephews and their children and grandchildren and sister-in-law Clara Hillyard. Finally, she leaves the devoted friends old and new who loved this unique woman.
The family thanks the many caring doctors and other caregivers who helped Virginia over the years, and in particular Dr. Richard Beardsley.
Calling will be Friday December 8, from 5:00– 8:00 p.m.
