Joyce A. Craven

Joyce Adelene Craven, 89, of Grinnell, died on Wednesday, August 15, 2012, at the Grinnell Health Care Center.

A graveside service will be held 10:30 a.m., Saturday, August 25, 2012, at Our Silent City Cemetery near Kellogg with Rev. Mary Arnold, Chaplain of the Hospice Compassus of Cedar Rapids, officiating. Friends may call at the Smith Funeral Home in Grinnell from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. on Saturday.

Memorials in Joyce's name may be directed to Hospice Compassus, 610 32nd Avenue S.W., Cedar Rapids, IA 52404.

Beginnings . . .
Joyce Adeline Craven, the daughter of David Homer Craven and Jane McCreight Nicholl Craven, was born on January 13, 1923 outside Laurel, Iowa, where her mother's Nicholl and McIlrath relatives farmed. Her father's family was from Wayne County in upstate New York, originally from the Yorkshire region. Her mother came from Ballymena, above Belfast in Northern Ireland. Joyce's father raised purebred shorthorn cattle, hogs and crops at the Kellogg farm. Joyce and her twin sister Janyce were the last in a family of ten and grew up in the Grinnell area where, as the brochure says, there were "miles of pavement shaded by thousands of trees, well-kept lawns, neighbors you will like and steady employment." She grew up among educators, farmers and a lot of good cooks, dividing her time between school and the farm.
In Grinnell . . .
As a young girl, Joyce and her twin sister attended Grinnell schools intermittently due to an epileptic condition. During the family's time in Grinnell, the area grew and prospered with local companies like De Kalb Hybrid Seed Corn, Swift and Company poultry and egg processing and Maytag headquarters in Newton closeby. While in school, Joyce also learned an array of homemaking skills from her sisters. In the late 1920s, Joyce's older sisters expected to continue their studies at Grinnell College, long known for its liberal arts program. Grinnell College was the first 4-year college west of the Mississippi and first in other areas too -- the first to admit women, play football, basketball, hold a track meet and to build dorms. Joyce and her sisters were proficient at gardening and needlework tasks, and all were good students. However, with the Great Depression, the family suffered major setbacks, and the sisters and brothers were relegated to less academic futures on the farm.
At Home in Malcom . . .
In the post-Depression economy of the 1930s, brother Dwight worked for the U.S. Postal Service and assisted in purchasing the family home and farmland north of Malcom. Like typical farm families, they butchered their own livestock and brought garden-fresh fruits and vegetables to the dinner table. With little entertainment outside the radio, Joyce and her sister embraced the popular tunes of their day and sang an amazingly good duet. After World War II broke out, they collaborated on a victory scrapbook on the order of the Shirley Temple scrapbooks they assembled as children.
During and After WWII . . .
Joyce worked with her unmarried sisters in the home at Malcom, caring for elderly parents, their gardens and parekeets. They corresponded regularly with their married sisters and shared ration books with their sister and husband in California. Joyce and her sisters loved children, a plus for their niece and multiple nephews. On visits to Malcom, they could be found playing monopoly, checkers or card games and sharing their latest projects.
In the decades after the war, Joyce and the others "down home" entertained summer visits from relatives throughout the U.S. Health permitting, they were always interested in relatives' lives and accomplishments. Harking back to a more simple time, Joyce and her sisters continued with their flower and vegetable gardens, Grace with her calves, Clarence with his hogs.
For many years, Sundays at the Malcom home were populated with visits from the married sisters' families, the 1950s installment known as "the Santy Claus Crowd." The sisters prepared sandwiches and desserts for the weekly spread, and I don't need to tell you – those were some memorable afternoons. The men smoked, talked farming and read the paper; the women retired to the kitchen, and the small fry ran wild outdoors or eavesdropped on the adults. From those kitchen confabs, you could hear the gales of laughter at the tales each told, and no topic was sacred.
After Malcom . . .
After Guinevere, the eldest, died in 1983, the Malcom farmhouse was sold and Joyce and Janyce moved among care facilities in Marshalltown, Montezuma, Newton and finally, Grinnell.

A loving and devoted sister and aunt, Joyce was preceded in death by her parents, three brothers, six sisters and a nephew. Those left to honor Joyce's memory are her nieces, nephews, and great-nieces and -nephews, some of whom include Gordon Barnes of Atlanta, Georgia, Gayle Veber of Portland, Oregon, Larry Barnes of Florida, Judith Coffee of Los Angeles, Kirke Quinn of Des Moines and Newton, Dr. Kent Quinn of Des Moines, Yale Veber of Portland, Oregon and Lisa (Quinn) Rucker of Chicago.