Hazel B. Linder

Our family is deeply saddened to announce the death of Hazel B. Linder, who passed away Wednesday, June 7, 2023, at Ascension Via Christi after a brief hospitalization. Services will be held at 12:30 pm on Friday, June 23rd, in the chapel at Downing & Lahey - West, 10515 W. Maple, Wichita. Interment will follow at Old Mission Cemetery, 3424 E. 21st Street, Wichita. Known as “Shay” to her closest friends and family, Hazel was born July 7, 1929, in the small southwestern Kansas town of Moscow, to Albert and Marie Buchter. She and her older brother Gene grew up during The Great Depression and Dust Bowl on the family farm near Protection, Kansas. At 17, she enrolled at Northwestern Oklahoma Teachers College in Alva, Oklahoma, from which she earned a degree in Education, with honors. It was at Northwestern where she met her future husband, Jim Linder. After teaching elementary school for a year in Elida, New Mexico, Hazel returned to Protection, Kansas, where she and Jim were married June 10, 1950, in a ceremony at the Methodist Church. The couple lived in a small apartment in Jim’s Oklahoma hometown of Waynoka for just a few short months before moving permanently to Wichita. She and Jim raised four adult children: Alan, Cynthia, Amy, & Barbara. In addition to these, she is survived by seven grandchildren and three---soon to be four---great-grandchildren. Hazel relished playing piano and had a lifelong appreciation of art, music, and literature. In her more active years, she loved to garden, and was particularly fond of her zinnias, portulaca, tiger lilies, and petunias, but especially so of her much-beloved purple clematis. She was an avid reader, maintained a sharp intellect all her days, and was extremely well-informed about current events. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests memorial donations in her name to one of her favorite charities: The Salvation Army, 350 North Market, Wichita, KS 67202, Kansas Humane Society, 3313 N. Hillside, Wichita, KS 67219, or Botanica, The Wichita Gardens 701 Amidon St., Wichita, KS 67203. Share tributes online at: www.dlwichita.com