Carolyn Sue Bearden

Carolyn "Sue" Bearden, of West Des Moines, IA, passed away on April 23, 2018 after a valiant effort from medical complications following femoral fracture surgery.

Sue was born on Thanksgiving Day November 25,1943, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Victor Ellsworth Hillegass in Akron, OH. She was a graduate of Akron's Buchtel High School in 1961. She attended Ohio University in Athens, OH and completed an X-ray Technician program at Akron City Hospital.

She met her future husband at Akron City Hospital and they were married on July 17, 1965. The marriage to James (Jim) Martin Bearden, MD, MPH, (almost fifty three years), was blessed with three children, Michael Stephen Bearden (Cape Coral, FL), Kimberly Sue Dusick (West Allis, WI), and Tracey Leigh Bearden, JD, MPA, (West Des Moines, IA). The children provided her with eight grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by her father, Victor Ellsworth Hillegass, MD; her mother, Gustava Webb Hillegass; and her sister, Linda Ann Bird. She is survived by her sister, Pamela Lane of Akron and nieces and nephews.

Sue, besides her early career in Radiology, worked in her husband's medical office, was a Claims Technician at BF Goodrich, and was a bedding design specialist at Boston Store in Brookfield, WI. She loved raising her children, serving as a Girl Scout Leader, cooking, and traveling. She and her husband traveled to all fifty states and visited twenty three countries in Europe, Asia, and the Caribbean. She enjoyed playing bridge, knitting, volunteering, and participating in church activities, and being a member of PEO. In her later years, she enjoyed playing with her nearly three year old twin grandchildren, Grayson and Ivy, and her three dogs were very precious to her.

Services will be held 10 a.m. Saturday at the Billow FAIRLAWN Chapel, 85 N. Miller Rd., where friends may call 1 hour before. Interment at Rose Hill Burial Park. (Billow FAIRLAWN Chapel)