Margaret Evelyn Cowden

Margaret Evelyn Cowden, 100, passed away Friday in Santa Fe, N. M.

Graveside celebration of life will be held at 11 a.m. Friday, at Highland Cemetery in Iowa Park, Texas, with Pastor Glen Pearce of the First Baptist Church officiating. Burial is under the direction of Dutton Funeral Home.

Margaret was born June 13, 1919, in Hopkins County, near Dyke. She moved to Iowa Park as a small child with her parents, Everett and Ruby Sewell. Everett was the longtime owner of Sewell Barber Shop in Iowa Park. She was a member of the First Baptist Church. She graduated from Iowa Park High School, then from North Texas State Teachers College, in 1941, with a degree in Home Economics. She married Jack Cowden of Iowa Park in 1942. While Jack served in the US Navy during World War II, Margaret taught elementary school in Iowa Park. She and her family lived in many locations including Hebbronville and Ft. Stockton, Texas, Davis and Duncan, Oklahoma, Vernal, Utah, Ft. Benton, Montana, Saratoga, Wyoming, and Lyons and Hays, Kansas. In 1953 the family moved to Ponca City, OK., and then in 1964 to Oklahoma City. For many years, she worked for the state of Oklahoma Food and Nutrition Services Department as a groundbreaking Nutritional Outreach Specialist, making presentations on nutrition programs around Oklahoma and at state and national health conferences. She was the first home economist hired by the State of Oklahoma to implement county nutritional programs. She retired from the State of Oklahoma in 1985. She resided in Oklahoma City until moving to Santa Fe, NM, in 2014.

Survivors include three sons, Jarrett of Bartlesville, OK., Steve of Tucson, AZ., and Jack of Santa Fe, N.M., a sister, Dorothy Faye Montgomery of Plano; three grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren.