Ruth Edwina Thornburg Hull (June 13,1920- September 20, 2017)

Beloved wife, mother, grandmother, and friend, Ruth Edwina Thornburg Hull of Lake Wales passed away in her sleep shortly before midnight on September 20, 2017, at the age of 97.

Well-known to many in the Lake Wales Community for the past 32 years by her volunteer work at Bok Tower with her late husband of 75 years, Duane Myers Hull, and as members of the First Presbyterian Church of Lake Wales, Mrs. Hull was born in Pennville, Indiana on June 13, 1920 to Charles and Elsie Thornburg, one of eight children.  Later the family moved to Alliance, Ohio, where she graduated from Alliance High School and married Duane Hull on October 4, 1941.

After her husband returned from his tour of duty as a Navy Seabee in World War II, including the battle of Iwo Jima, Duane and Edwina raised two daughters, Vida Joyce Hull, born in 1946 and Cynthia Nan Hull (1949-2012), in the house her husband built. She stressed involvement in religious and ethical values and in education to her daughters. Vida graduated with a PhD from Bryn Mawr College and has taught art history at East Tennessee State University for more than 30 years. Cynthia earned her Masters in Sociology from the University of South Florida, and served non-profit charities as Director of Offenders’ Aid and Restoration in Arlington, Virginia, and Director of United Community Ministries in Fairfax, Virginia. As a member of the First Methodist Church, Edwina served as Education Director during the 1950s.  Edwina and Duane acted as a host family for foreign college students from different countries, including Nigeria, India, and China.

Edwina relocated with her husband, then Chief Engineer of the Alliance Machine Company, to Miami, Florida, in 1960, where she worked with Laubach Literacy, serving as state secretary. She also took an international literacy tour, including India, Thailand, Egypt, and Jordan.  Later her husband’s engineering career would take them back to Alliance, as well as residences in Horsehay, England, and Columbia, South Carolina.

In Columbia, she and her husband were members of the Windsor Lake Park Methodist Church, and again became a host family to international college students.

Beginning in the late 1970s, she would also travel to Pisgah Forest, North Carolina with her husband on weekends and assist him in building “The Crescent,” a modern four-bedroom home designed by Duane and built into the Black Knob Mountain.  Edwina, who loved butterflies, appropriately named the street the house was built on Butterfly Lane. She also loved giraffes.

Upon wintering with her husband in retirement in Lake Wales before moving to the locale full time in 1999, the couple became active volunteers with Bok Tower and Pinewood.  In 2014 Duane and Edwina were awarded the Outstanding Volunteer Service Award from the Florida Association of Museums.

In the 1990s Edwina also became a devotee of genealogy, tracing her family tree back to the ninth century.

Edwina was pre-deceased by her husband on July 26, 2017, by their daughter Cynthia in 2012, and by her two brothers and five sisters.  Survivors include her daughter Vida of Johnson City, Tennessee; two grandsons, Marcus Kitchen Billson IV of Johnson City and Duncan Hull Holley of Bar Harbor, Maine; her great-granddaughter, Pierce Joslyn Holley; and a number of nieces and nephews, including Carol Grimes of Lake Wales and Thomas Thornburg of Bartow.

A memorial service will be held at the chapel of the First Presbyterian Church of Lake Wales on Saturday, December 16, at 2:00 p.m.