At the age of ninety-three, Laura Jean Warren peacefully died in Abilene, Texas, on July 25, 2018. Hers was a life characterized by selflessness, joy and happiness.Her greatest joy was found in her daughter, Laura Moore of Abilene, and in her three granddaughters, Madison, London and Annelise, to whom she faithfully demonstrated the gifts of open-heartedness, broad charity, respect for all and a conscious devotion to doing what is right and good.Born January 31, 1925, Jean was the second oldest among nine children who were raised by loving parents, Clark and Laura Banister, who instilled the valuable traits and attitudes that come from living on a family farm during the Great Depression and that sustain one throughout life. Nurtured to value family, faith and church, Jean learned early that contentment was not rooted in possessions or fortune; consequently, she had an optimistic outlook and the days were joy-filled throughout her life.Always one who loved school, Jean never forgot Miss Mamie McCorkindale and her lessons, chief among them: Do it right or do it over. Jean graduated from Wayne State Teachers College in 1948 and began a career teaching English to students in Nebraska, Wyoming and Texas.Married to Paul Warren in Greybull, Wyoming, in 1951, they moved to Big Spring in 1955 where Jean taught at Runnels and Goliad Junior High Schools for twenty-six years and later was a columnist for the Big Spring Herald.Jean was a charter member of College Baptist Church in Big Spring where she served as a children’s Sunday School teacher for many years.Reading and learning were threads woven throughout her life and she held a particular fondness for poetry. In the final days of her life she would still quote long passages of Longfellow, Robert Louis Stevenson, Alfred Noyes, Robert Frost and, her favorite, Emily Dickinson, who faithfully reminded that life is good and “here is a brighter garden.” In trying times, it would be Frost who nudged her with the “The Dust of Snow” and renewed her grateful heart. But it was a daily habit of reading the Bible that refreshed her soul. The 12th chapter of Ecclesiastes held her favorite verse: “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return to God who gave it” and it was Philippians 2 by which she lived her day: “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others.”Preceding her in death were her parents, her husband, Paul, and three brothers, John, Hayes and Charles Banister.Survivors include her daughter, Laura (Jay) Moore of Abilene; three granddaughters, Madison, London and Annelise Moore; siblings Margie Anderson of Lamesa, Shirley Torres of Albuquerque, Bill Banister of Las Animas, Colorado, Don Banister of Boise, Idaho, and Janet Crosier of Lincoln, Nebraska. She also leaves a host of nieces, nephews and friends in Big Spring and at University Place in Abilene.The family wishes to express sincere thanks to Dr. Allen Schultz and his staff.Jean’s faith was abiding, deep and sure.“I never spoke with God,Nor visited in heaven,Yet certain am I of the spot,As if the chart were given.”Emily DickinsonJean donated her body for medical research. A memorial service will be held at a later time.,
