Carol Straley Trimmer, 75, died on November 20, 2019, after a long struggle in the Hospice Unit on the Oncology Ward at IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital.

Carol was born on January 17, 1944, in Corvallis, Oregon, where her father, Gordon Straley was training in the Army Officer Candidate School in preparation for combat in World War II. Carol and her mother, Virginia, traveled by train back to the Straley home in West Lafayette, Indiana. They lived there until her father returned from Europe where upon he resumed his position as head football coach and athletic director at the local high school.
In 1961, Carol graduated with honors from West Lafayette High School and began her undergraduate education. She received her BA with a double major in English and Theater from Purdue University in 1966 where she served as an officer in the Kappa Alpha Theta fraternity and met her future husband, Joseph F. Trimmer, in the Purdue Library. They were married in 1966 and Carol taught English at East Tipp High School while Joe completed his doctorate in English at Purdue.

In 1968, the couple moved to Muncie where Joe accepted a teaching position in the English Department at Ball State University. For twenty years, Carol worked as a legislative aide for Congressman Phil Sharp. Upon his retirement, she worked for several years as a Permissions Editor for Harcourt Brace Publishers and then for fifteen years as Director of Outreach for Indiana Public Radio until her retirement in 2010.

Carol was an extremely active volunteer. She worked for C.A.S.A. (Court Appointed Special Advocate), helping young people work their way through the judicial system. In addition, she served on Ball State University’s Discovery Group, providing funds for innovative immersive learning projects. She also worked on numerous art and cultural organizations through-out Indiana. She had a special affection for Arts Place in Portland, Indiana, a community she came to call her second hometown.

During the last months of her life, Carol was able to award the annual scholarships she endowed in her father’s name to the outstanding male and female scholar athletes graduating from West Lafayette High School. She tried—in vain—to complete her annual creative project—making beautifully individualized Christmas cards for over three hundred friends in Muncie, Portland and across the country. Knowing that she was ill, she also managed one last trip to her favorite natural spot, Martha’s Vineyard, where she recorded the sounds of birds, winds and water.

She is survived by her husband of fifty-three years, Joe; her son, Bob, Indianapolis; and her sister, Susan Straley, Richmond, California.

A Celebration of Life was held on Sunday, December 15, 2019, at 3:00 p.m. at Minnetrista, 1200 North Minnetrista Pkwy, Muncie, IN 47303.

In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be sent to The Community Foundation of Muncie and Delaware County for the CASA of Delaware County Fund, 200 E. Jackson Street, #100, Muncie, IN 47305; OR to the general endowment fund of Arts Place, P.O. Box 804, Portland, Indiana, 47371.

Elm Ridge Funeral Home is assisting the family with arrangements. Online condolences to the family may be sent to www.elmridgefuneralhome.com.

2011

Twenty-one years ago I was on the staff of the local Congressman, a job I held until he retired from politics at the end of '94. After taking a job at a marketing firm in Indy and commuting for a year and a half, I landed at Indiana Public Radio-WBST, the public radio station owned by Ball State University here in Muncie. I do fund raising and outreach--not that different from politics, when you come to think about it! Our son Bob married in 2000 to a woman from Bloomington who has a son (Eric) from a previous marriage, and he currently works for a commercial radio station there. Joe's mother is 94 and is living at Mulberry Retirement Home a few miles east of Lafayette. Joe is still on the English Dept. faculty at Ball State but for the past 7 years, he has been Director of the Virginia Ball Center for Creative Inquiry, an immersive learning program funded with a generous grant from the late Virginia Ball. He doesn't know exactly when it might be, but he would like to return to teaching if and when the Center runs out of funds. Thanks in large part to his successful publishing enterprises, we have been able to do a fair amount of traveling: China, England, France, Ireland, Italy, and Denmark, with yearly summer vacations on Martha's Vineyard (we rent, not own, a house there--we're not quite in that league!) As many of you may know, my mother passed away in 1996 and my dad in 1999; sister Susan lives in the Bay area still. Lots of years have passed but Red Devil blood still courses in my veins!