Suellen H. Wood

Reverend Suellen H. Wood, 74, passed away early Tuesday, May 29th at Brewster Place in Topeka. She was born Suellen Georgann Hoffmeister on March 4, 1944 to Helen Euson Hoffmeister and Walter William Hoffmeister in Barrington, Illinois. Suellen’s parents divorced in 1949. Suellen and her mother went to live with Helen’s mother Kathleen. Her mom found love again in Robert Nixon Gray and they were married on December 23rd, 1955. Suellen graduated from Senn High School in Chicago in 1962. She met John F. Wood in church and they were married in1967. Soon after getting married John was transferred to Kansas City Missouri to take a chemist position at Cook Paint & Varnish Company. Their first daughter was born in September of 1969, their second in December of 1972. John was transferred to Detroit in 1972 and the family settled in Troy, Michigan. The family stayed in Troy until 1983 when John and Suellen parted ways. Suellen moved with the girls to Kansas City and started a job as Executive Administrative Assistant at a Stock Brokerage. She later changed positions to work at DST as an Client Service Representative and worked there until the early 90’s. In 1991 she went back to school at Avila College to complete a degree in Social Work, which she finished in 1995. It was during her final year at Avila she heard the call and decided to move on to Central Baptist Seminary where she completed a Masters in Divinity in 1999. When she graduated from Central and was ordained as a Presbyterian minister. In 2000 she was awarded  a position in Osage City, KS. where she served as Pastor for several years. She retired in 2015 and became a part-time minister at the Second Presbyterian Church of Topeka. There she stayed until she suffered a stroke in 2016 and had to go into a nursing home.   She will live on in the hearts of her daughters, Laurie K. Ashley and her husband Wilson (Pete) Jr. of Kingsley, Michigan and Jennifer W. Brown and her husband LeRoy F. Brown III of Lawson, Missouri; grandchildren, Janae L. Ashley and Miranda A. Ashley and a great-grandchild, Kamden Satterly; step brothers, William Gray of Raytown, Missouri and Robert Nixon Gray, Jr. of Oregon; a cousin Thomas Euson of Laurel, Indiana.  Memorial services will be held at 2:00 P.M., Saturday, June 2nd at the First Presbyterian Church in Osage City. Inurnment will take place at a later date at Mt. Carmel Cemetery in Chicago. The family will receive friends from 1:00 P.M. until service time of Saturday at the Church. Memorial contributions may be made to the Great Lakes Hospice and sent in care of the VanArsdale Funeral Chapel at 107 N. 6th St., Osage City, Kansas 66523. Condolences may be expressed vanarsdalefs.com.