Mary Lou (Bethel) Roberts was born Sunday, October 24, 1926 in McCormick, Illinois in Pope County to Jewell Guy Bethel & Elma Houston.
In the 1930 census, the family was located in Hammond Lake, Indiana. Mary Lou was then 3 years old and her father was doing his best to support the family during the depression by working as a laborer in the steel mills.
By the 1940 census, Mary Lou was aged 13 and her family was living in Marion at 409 W. Union Street, which they owned and valued at $1,500. Her father was working as a janitor at the Washington School.
She attended First Baptist Church in Marion from her youth and attended regularly until her health would not allow it. By age nine she had been baptized, became a Christian and joined the church, led by her father, Guy Bethel. She was a faithful member for seventy-six years. As an adult she served on many Church committees, often as chairman.
She married Carl Tyner in 1944 and started a family but he passed away four years later in 1948, leaving her with two small children, Belinda Sue and Bruce Tyner. She later married J. Addison Roberts in 1950, producing a child, Addison Len Roberts. Together, Mary Lou & Addison shared fifty-nine years and raised three children.
Her love was for the young people of the Church which led her to become a Sunday School teacher, Superintendent & Director in the youth department of Sunday School & Church Training. She was also a Church G.A. (Missionary) leader and association G.A. leader. For eight years she was chairman of Youth Activities, which was the Fifth Organization of First Baptist, often having two-hundred in attendance for major events. She was Chairman of Funding for the Second Education office, gym and kitchen building.
Mrs. Roberts worked in many capacities and held state licenses in Insurance, Real Estate and Nursing Home Administration. She and her husband Addison developed Edgewood and Roberts subdivisions. She donated much of her time to the Greater Marion Area Chamber of Commerce, believing that to help a city have the best possible business climate is necessary for individuals to best support their families.
Mary Lou was the first person recognized for securing new Chamber members. She served as Chairman of most committees, the most visible being Chairman of the Building Committee. She oversaw the security of land from the State up until completion of a furnished and paid for, dedicated building. She was the first elected female Board Member, first female President of the Chamber and the first female Man of the Year. During Women’s History Week she was recognized as Regional Woman of Distinction.
She was invited to attend & contribute to a discussion of the Williamson County Commissioners where it was decided to start impose taxes on hotel & motel charges. These funds have contributed to several County amenities, including the Williamson County Pavilion (now Marion Pavillion), and the salaries of tourism promoters.
Mrs. Roberts was a member of the Williamson County Blue Ribbon Sesquicentennial Commission, and served as Chairman of Program & Events; choosing to meet regularly with fifteen committees, which are recounted in the first Williamson County history book since 1905.
She dedicated a number of years to each community effort, respectively: The United Way, Red Cross Bloodmobile, The American Heart Association and an original member of the Goddard Chapel restoration Commission. Mary Lou also designed the stylized “M” portion of the Marion City Flag.
During a trip to the Holy Land in 1999, Mrs. Roberts husband, Addison, was responsible for the photographic reporting for Church members and their Preacher. Especially noteworthy was a picture taken aboard a vessel in the Sea of Galilee; a cloudy Sunday morning sky suddenly opened and the sun miraculously shined through.
She was proud to be a wife and homemaker, always believing that being a Christian mother was the most important opportunity with which she was blessed. Mary Lou hopes that her life will hold meaning for those she has encountered in her time on Earth.
Mary Lou Roberts, 85, of Marion, passed away at 9:00 AM on Thursday, June 14, 2012 at Heartland Regional Medical Center with her family at her side.
She was survived by her children, Belinda Sue Tyner-Ledbetter of Moab, UT and Addison Len & Robin Roberts of Marion; daughter-in-law, Carol Tyner of Marion; grandchildren, Angella Roberts, Aleah & Brandon White of Marion, Charissa Ledbetter-Campbell & James Campbell of Del Rey Oaks, CA, Tricia & Chad Bailey and Tammy & Eddie Holland all of Goreville; great-grandchildren, Emma McLaskey, Mariah and Ethan White, Jamie, Dylan and Katelyn Bailey, and Paige, Sarah Grace and Ryan Holland.
Mary Lou was preceded in death by her first husband, Carl; second husband, J. Addison; son, Bruce Tyner (1946-2009); parents; four grandparents; beloved brother, Jewell Junior Bethel during the Battle of the Bulge in WWII; brothers, Donald H. Bethel and William G. Bethel and sister, Juanita Addison.
Funeral services for Mrs. Roberts were held at Noon, Saturday, June 16, 2012 at Blue Funeral Home in Marion with Dr. Jack Hill, Mayor Bob Butler and Elaine Hancock officiating. Interment followed in Rose Hill Cemetery. Visitation preceded the service from 10:00 AM until Noon. Blue Funeral Home in Marion assisted the family with arrangements.
Mary Lou Roberts, Excerpted from Jari’s Jottings by Jari Jackson, courtesy of the Marion Daily Republican and republished in the 1989 Sesquicentennial History book
Mary Lou Roberts seems always to put the extra time and effort needed into any project that she takes on whether it is for her church, the community or another worthwhile cause.
As chairman of the Sesquicentennial program and events committee, Mary Lou spent hundreds of hours in committee meetings and in coordinating celebration events.
An achiever most of her life, Mary Lou does everything she can to make a success of every project she tackles. Her smiling determination and her gutsy approach to work make her a doer from the moment she signs on any project.
“I’m not a joiner just to join,” she noted recently. “If I’m going to be a part of anything, I want to contribute.”
Anyone who has sat on a committee with Mary Lou knows she is far from just a “contributor.” She listens and offers suggestions and gets to the core of the matter quickly, without wasting time. She demands of herself “full steam ahead” and likes to see results.
She has been for several years a “mover and a shaker” in Greater Marion Area Chamber of Commerce programs. She worked to boost the chamber’s membership, chaired the important building committee for the chamber office building and has worked to make bigger and better the annual chamber dinner meetings.
Mary Lou served in 1979 as the first woman president of the Marion chamber, and in 1987 was honored at the chamber dinner as the Marion “Man of the Year.” She also has been honored as a “woman of distinction” during a national women’s week program at Southern Illinois University.
A mother and a grandmother, Mary Lou has managed over the years to work at different jobs but also has taken time out to be a homemaker and mother. She and her husband, Addison Roberts, were developers of the Edgewood Subdivision and she also is involved in real estate sales. She formerly has worked in insurance work, in the federal rent control program, as a court bailiff, and as a nursing home administrator.
The daughter of Elma Bethel and the late Jewell Bethel, Sr., Mary Lou is a woman of many interests, who loves to wear hats (she has about 40 of them), likes to sew (she created her own Sesquicentennial dresses), and also enjoys reading and other needlework and crafts. She also is a member of the Marion Garden Club.
Mary Lou has also been involved for many years in the activities of the Marion First Baptist Church, where she heads the building fund committee for the church’s new addition. She has been a Sunday School teacher, worked with the church’s mission worked with the church’s missionary program, and been the assistant Sunday School director.
While a student at Marion High School, she was involved in school plays and debate, a band majorette and other activities.
Despite her many activities over the years, Mary Lou rates being a mother as “the most important thing I’ve ever done.” She has three children, including Belinda Sue Tyner Ledbetter of Baltimore, Maryland; Bruce Tyner and Addison Len Roberts of Marion.
She has a lot of pride in her three children and also her five grandchildren, Angella Roberts, Aleah Roberts, Charissa Ledbetter, Tricia Tyner, and Tammy Tyner.
Mary Lou Roberts has achieved many “firsts” in her lifetime, and has been an important community leader helping to steer successfully many projects. She was also a strong contributing member of the county-wide Sesquicentennial Commission, helping steer all the programs for the county celebration and even finding time to author several of the articles in the Williamson County Sesquicentennial History Book.
(Extracted from Marion Daily Republican obits and an article written by Jari Jackson, courtesy of the Marion Daily Republican, published in the 1989 Sesquicentennial History; Federal Census Records; compiled by Sam Lattuca on 10/29/2013)