Gertrude Bennet Steffes

Funeral services for Gertrude Bennet (Land) Steffes, 83, Clinton resident, will be at 10 a.m. Wednesday in the Custer Avenue Baptist Church, officiated by Rev. Ross Foster.

Mrs. Steffes died Sunday, May 17, 2015, in the Clinton Regional Hospital. She was born Feb. 18, 1932, in Texarkana, the daughter of Clifford Land and Nettie (Newell) Land.

She was raised in Michigan and Oklahoma. She had moved to Oklahoma in 1948 with her family where she met her future husband, Leo Edward Steffes Jr., and they were married on June 14, 1949 in Canute.

They made their home in Canute where they farmed until 1956, and they moved to Clinton.  Mrs. Steffes worked in day care centers and baby sat for others.  She had been a resident of Grace Living Center since January of 2010.

Preceding her in death were her parents; her husband; seven brothers and sisters, Joyce, Edna Mae, Linda Faye, Betty Jo, Juanell, W.C. and infant brother, Charlie; and her best friend, Ella Mae Terrell.

Survivors include five daughters, Sally Steffes, Sharon James and her husband, Bill Fleming, Rondena Williams and her husband, Mark, all of Clinton, Edwina Hurley and her husband, Rickey, of Tulsa, Lisa Ann Woody, of Meeker; five sons, Clifford Steffes, Johnney Steffes, Gary Lynn Steffes and his wife, Rita, Mickey Steffes and his wife, Kathy, all of Clinton, and Larry Steffes and his wife, Dorie, of Virginia; two sisters, Etta Tidwell, and her husband, Tex, of Lubbock, Texas,  and Peggy Land, of California; 24 grandchildren and one on the way; 57 great-grandchildren; and three great-great-grandchildren and three on the way.

Burial will follow in the Clinton Cemetery, under the direction of Kiesau-Lee Funeral Home of Clinton.