Opal B Crutchfield

Opal B Crutchfield Cussons passed into eternity at 3:45 am Friday, March 30, 2012, at Jenkins Living Center in Watertown, SD at the age of 89 years, 6 months and 7 days. Her life will be celebrated in a service held at Westside Wesleyan Church in Bristol, SD, on Thursday afternoon at 2:00 pm. Visitation will be held at Fiksdal Funeral Home in Webster on Wednesday, April 4, between the hours of 4:00 and 6:00 pm, with prayer service at 5:30 pm. Opal B Crutchfield was born September 1, 1922, to Breemer and Bernice Francis (McCain) Crutchfield in Winfield, AR. She graduated from Waldron High School in 1940 and from Ouachita Baptist College in 1944 with a degree in Home Economics Education. She married Clayton Jackson Cussons, who had been stationed at her college as a WWII Cadet, on November 18, 1944 in Webster, SD, and was employed in Home Economics at the Willow Lake school district that year. She was an excellent wife, mother, hostess . . . and a prize winner golfer on the local level. Opal created a wonderful home for her family. As her children grew up, she taught home economics for a time in the Florence and Henry High Schools. She later became a real estate agent within the Langager Agency, had a jail ministry for a time, loved reaching out to newcomers to the community, being active in community affairs and serving her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. She grew up in the Waldron Baptist Church, was a member of Webster United Methodist Church and later, with their daughter and son-in-law, at Westside Wesleyan Church in Bristol, SD. She thoroughly enjoyed entertaining and spending time with her family, her much loved sister, Thelma Lee, and entire extended family in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Tennessee and Wisconsin; and traveling for those times with her precious husband, Clayton. Opal became a resident of Sun Dial Manor in Bristol in February of 2011 after breaking her hip; transferring to Jenkins Living Center in Watertown in September 2011 to be near her husband who is at Cedar View Assisted Living there. Survivors include her husband of 67 years, Clayton; their son, Jackson and Susan Cussons, Hudson WI; their three daughters: Carolyn and Jon Shultis, Webster; Cathy and Rick Martin, Irving TX; Julie and Michael Sarrett, Goodlettsville TN; fifteen grandchildren; eleven great-grandchildren; and six great-great grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents.