Nina Marie Sexton

Nina Marie (Avery, Rutledge) Sexton, 85, died on October 17, 2023 at Lawrence Memorial Hospital in Lawrence, Kansas. She lived in Lawrence, but also lived in and around Hutchinson, Kansas, and Kansas City, Missouri during her lifetime. She was a wife, mother, proud grandmother and proud great-grandmother.

She passed peacefully in her sleep surrounded by her children.Nina was born in 1938 in Hutchinson, KS to Clarence and L. Marie Avery (Cherokee Nation) and had five siblings: Jack Avery, Jo Morse, James Avery, Ronald Avery, and Jerry Avery, and half-brother, Robert Emrick, all of whom preceded her in death. Her first husband, Verle Rutledge, deceased, and she divorced around 1980 after a long marriage. She later met the love of her life, Charles “Bud” Sexton. They had a wonderful relationship and warm, loving marriage that was cut short by Bud’s untimely death from cancer in 2002.

She was survived by daughter, Melany Rutledge of Lenexa, KS, and son, Michael Rutledge, with whom she lived, of Lawrence, Kansas. She is also survived by step-daughter, Rita Sexton and her significant other Sanj Kirubakaran of Centerview, Missouri; and step-son, Daniel Sexton and his wife Julie Sexton of Kansas City, Missouri. She is survived by two grandsons, Chad Stieglitz and his wife, Maggie Stieglitz, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Austin Ketchum, of Austin, Texas. She is also survived by step-granddaughter Cameron Sexton of Kansas City, Missouri. She is also survived by great-grandson, Cal Stieglitz of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

She is survived by many nieces and nephews on the Avery family side and their families around the nation. She was preceded in death by her first niece, Sonya Cloud of the Cherokee Nation Reservation, Oklahoma. She has a large extended family on the Cloud side living in the Cherokee Nation Reservation and around the country, some of whom walked on before her.

She is survived by many step-nephews and step-nieces on the Sexton side in the Dallas, Texas area and Livermore, California. She was preceded in death by a step-nephew, Patrick Sexton, of Leavenworth, Kansas.

She was a proud citizen of the Cherokee Nation. She was a Christian from her teenage years, attending the Pilgrim of Holiness, Nazarene, Presbyterian and, finally, the United Methodist churches. She taught Children’s Church for the Bethany Church of the Nazarene in the 1960s to 1970s, which was a ministry she enjoyed immensely.

Nina dropped out of Hutchinson High School, Hutchinson, Kansas, to get married to Verle Rutledge at 17. After her divorce, she took night school and obtained her GED in 1984 at Hutchinson Community College, Hutchinson, Kansas. She moved to Kansas City to live with her son and in July 1988, obtained her Associate of Applied Science degree and Paralegal Certificate at Johnson County Community College, Overland Park, Kansas.

She worked many jobs in her life. She was a stern, but loving bus driver for the Buhler School District in Buhler, Kansas, getting the “worst” route but earning the love and affection of her riders; she worked as a machinist at Cessna Fluid & Power Division in Hutchinson, Kansas, she worked at a custom drapery shop in Arlington, Kansas learning to create custom drapes and do custom machine quilting, opened her own custom quilting shop in Arlington, Kansas, worked at a bag factory in Hutchinson, Kansas, worked as a security dispatcher at Indian Springs Mall in Kansas City, Kansas through college, worked as a paralegal at several law offices in Kansas City, Missouri, before working through Manpower running their custom services shop at IBM in Kansas City, Missouri. She retired in 2002 to take care of her husband in his final days. She moved to Hutchinson, Kansas to help her daughter with her youngest son as he finished junior high and high school. She moved with her son, Michael to Lawrence, Kansas in 2020 during the first lockdown of the pandemic.

Nina Sexton’s family is happy that she has walked on to celebrate in the next world with her many relations, friends and the Creator. She remains surrounded by love. She would want to express her gratitude to anyone and everyone who contributed to her life in any way.

The Cherokee do not have a word for “Goodbye”. It seems too final, which goes against our beliefs. Instead, when someone walks on, we say:

ᏙᏓᏓᎪᎲᎢ, ᎡᏥ. (Dodadagohvhi, Etsi.)

Until we meet again, Maman.