Lynnette “Lynne”‘s Obituary Like most great figures in history, Lynnette Faye Thurman came from humble beginnings. She was born to Edwin and Violet Flaming on July 22, 1957 in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. Lynne grew up a wild-haired farm girl who loved horseback riding and roaming the acreage of her family’s ranch.
She learned from her father how to run a ranch and be as tough a former Navy Seabee could be. She inherited her mother’s passion for art and quickly exceeded her mother’s ability, creating beautiful works with an expertise surpassing her age. She had a love for travel and experiencing new people and cultures traveling to all fifty states, and over twelve foreign countries.
Lynne would follow her passion for art and her hunger for knowledge to college where she earned a scholarship at the University of Miami-NEO. She would eventually graduate from the University of Central Oklahoma and begin doing what most people only dream of, making a living doing what she loved. She began working as a freelance artist and companies were more than willing to pay for her vision.
Lynne continued her education and would eventually earn her Masters’ degree in Instructional Technology from Wayland Baptist University. While working for Cato as the director of the advertising department, she would meet the love of her life, Todd Thurman, who at the time was a lowly mail clerk. After some flirtatious notes, they realized they shared a similar taste in humor and their love flourished into a bond that would rival the truest love stories of history.
On November 22, 1987, they were married at the First Nazarene Church in Bethany, Oklahoma and later she gave birth to two sons Nicholas and Alexander. Lynne would instill her desire for knowledge in her children, encouraging them to strive toward their goals with the same positivity and drive she had lived by. Lynne tried her hand at graphic design and not only mastered this new platform but developed her own tricks of the trade that would later be and still are taught to future aspiring artists and graphic designers.
In fact, she would later become an instructor at the Oklahoma City Community College (OCCC) where she would teach these skills to the new generation of artists whose medium would become computer programs and key strokes rather than acrylics and canvas. It was here she found a new path, sharing her love and passion through teaching. Todd’s path led him to a successful coaching career and would eventually lead their family to Plainview, Texas where Lynne followed her new zeal for teaching to Ash Middle school.
There, she shared her love of art to bright-eyed sixth-graders who after only a few short months started producing projects that exceeded some college students’ works. She inspired hundreds of children to follow their passions as she had and quickly became the “cool teacher” who’s class list would fill up as quickly as it opened. Through the years, Lynne continued to support her husband’s coaching career becoming a surrogate mother to every student that stepped through her door.
There were no limits to the amount of love and caring that she could give, and no one left her home wanting or lacking in self-worth. Despite this constant revolving door of homesick students needing her nurturing spirit, her own children never felt they lacked attention from their mother. Lynne’s purpose in life was to spread love and encouragement to everyone in her presence, never once thinking of herself and she always seemed to have an endless supply of love to give.
After finally landing in Weatherford, Oklahoma, Lynne began working as a Director for the Stafford Air and Space Museum using her creative talents and foresight to update the museum into a nationally renowned science epicenter. She became acquaintances with some the most brilliant astronauts in history including Jim Lovell and Neil Armstrong and would consistently receive house calls from Thomas Stafford himself to discuss nothing more than how their days were going. Eventually, her path would lead her to become the Director of Foundation for Southwestern Oklahoma State University where she would work side-by-side with Todd until her retirement.
In the spring of 2013, Lynne was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and was estimated by the doctors to only have a few more months to live. Rather than wallow in desperation and self-pity, Lynne began waging her own personal war against the disease. She sprang to the cancer message boards and began offering support and advice from her own experiences encouraging everyone she was in contact with and refusing to dwell on her own condition.
She would become one of the poster-childs for the “Cancer Below the Belt” organization inspiring others to continue the fight. Defeat was never a word in her vocabulary, and she wore her signature smile through every treatment, giving death her hearty laugh that would fill everyone near her with hope. For nearly six years, Lynne would beat cancer three more times and go on many more adventures with her beloved husband, Todd, from the Louvre in Paris to the rolling hills of Napa Valley.
On January 12, 2019, she would finally find peace and go home to her creator. Lynne is survived by her husband, Todd, her two sons, Nick and Alex, her daughter-in-law, Hannah, her granddaughter Faye, her brother and sister, Chuck and Pat, and her adopted son Robert; but truly, she leaves behind countless people who all saw her as a mother, sister, and friend. She genuinely loved everyone she came into contact with and their lives were that much brighter because of her.
She saw the best in everyone and because of her love made them see the best in themselves. Even though she is not here to give us the constant encouragement we all expect, her memory alone gives us the courage to keep the love and happiness in our hearts that she has always shared with the world.
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