The funeral for Clara Berniece Metcalf Thornburgh, 87, will be 11:00 a.m. Monday at the Anderson-Burris Funeral Home, 3002 North Van Buren, Enid.  The Reverends Don Johnson and John McLemore will officiate.  A private burial will be in the Karoma Cemetery, Goltry.

            Berniece was born on September 2, 1919, to William Logan and Irene Gipson Metcalf.  She was born in the two-story house that was built in rural Jet where her father made a homestead after he made the Oklahoma Land Run in 1893.  Berniece died Thursday, June 21, 2007, at St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center, Enid.

            Berniece was a 1936 graduate of Jet High School.  She attended Phillips University for two years and the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond for one semester.  She became homesick and returned to Jet.  She married Roy Lavern Thornburgh on July 28, 1940, in Cherokee.  They farmed and ranched on the Thornburgh and Metcalf homesteads near Jet for 34 years.  Berniece and Lavern moved to Enid in 1974.  Berniece was a homemaker.  She volunteered once a week at St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center for 53 years.  She also volunteered at the Enid Central Christian Church library.  Berniece and Lavern attended the Jet Christian Church from 1943- 1974.  There she was a Sunday School teacher, was active in children’s Christian youth groups, was a leader in Christian Youth Fellowship, and actively participated in Christian Women Fellowship.  Since moving to Enid, Berniece became active at the Enid Central Christian Church.  She loved being a homemaker and wrapped her life around her family.

            Surviving are her husband, Lavern of the home, her children, Christie Irene Jackson and husband, Tim of Tigard, Oregon, Patrick Ivan Thornburgh and wife, Joyce of Jet, and Cathie Lea Whipkey and husband, Harold of Higgins, Texas; ten grandchildren, sixteen great-grandchildren, and one great-great-grandchild.  Berniece was preceded in death by her brothers Lee William Metcalf, Logan Dywane Metcalf, and Robert Leonadis Metcalf, and by her sisters Mary Evelyn Huff and Alice Irene Whitney.

            In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Clara Berniece Thornburgh Memorial Fund at the Enid Central Christian Church, or to the St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center Volunteer Program.