Lorene Vivian Bearden, Lawton, was born on January 29, 1916, in Fort Worth, Texas, to George and Harriet (Hattie) Tunal. She died in Lawton on January 15, 2015, at the age of 98 years and 11 1/2 months. A Service of Celebration of her life will be held at 1:30 pm on Saturday, April 4, 2015 at the Immanuel Baptist Church, 1314 SW 11th Street, Lawton, Oklahoma. Following the celebration, her remains will be placed at Sunset Memorial Gardens. Mrs. Bearden had many joys in her life. She loved her family and spoke dearly of her own mother and father. She had many stories of how she and her two brothers grew up moving around with her family to different oil well sites in the original "Boomtown" days around Burkburnett, Texas. After living in the oil fields, she and her family lived on a farm near Boyd, Texas. The family then moved to Fort Worth, where her father became a machinist. She experienced many hardships of the Great Depression, but she managed to graduate in 1933 from W. C. Stripling (now Arlington Heights) High School in Fort Worth. All during World War II she exchanged letters with a young sailor serving on the island of Samoa in the South Pacific. After the sailor returned to the States, she took a train to Richmond, California, and married John Bearden on July 14, 1945. They were married for nearly 53 years until his death in 1998. After the war, they settled in Lawton in the house where they raised a family and lived for the rest of their lives. She was employed as a teacher's aide at Will Rogers Elementary School. She loved being a wife, mother, grandmother and great grandmother. Hers was a shining example of a life well lived. Survivors include her son and daughter-in-law Will and Sherry Bearden of Garden Ridge, Texas; brother, Joe R. Tunal, of Benbrook, Texas; and son-in-law Bob Jeffries of Elgin, Oklahoma. Her four grandchildren are Joshua Bearden of Denver, Colorado; Rebekah Sculley of San Antonio, Texas; Kevin Hillary of Medicine Park, Oklahoma; and Brian Hillary of Elgin, Oklahoma. Mrs. Bearden is also survived by nine great-grandchildren, several nieces and nephews, and a host of friends, as well as generations of children whom she influenced for good and for God during her many years as a church nursery worker. Mrs. Bearden was preceded in death by her husband, John, of Lawton; her parents of Benbrook, Texas; her brother, William Charles (Buck) Tunal of Lamarque, Texas, and her daughter, Carolyn Sue Jeffries of Elgin, Oklahoma. In lieu of flowers donations can be made to the Fellowship Hall Fund of Immanuel Baptist Church, where she was a nursery worker and Sunday School teacher for over 40 years.