Joyce J. Collier

Joyce Jean Grant Collier, 71, of Geneseo, passed away on Sunday, January 22, 2023, at her home. She is now with the Lord and reunited with her husband, Robert Collier. Funeral services will be held at 10:30 AM on Monday, January 30, 2023 at Vandemore Funeral Home and Crematory-Geneseo Chapel. Deacon Robert O'Rourke will officiate.  The funeral service will be livestreamed at https://www.vandemorefuneralhome.com/live-stream.  Visitation will be held from 3-5 PM on Sunday, January 29, 2023, at the funeral home. She will be laid to rest at a later date at Davenport Memorial Park. In lieu of flowers memorials can be made in her name to Richmond Hill Barn Theatre or the Henry County Humane Society-Geneseo.

Joyce Jean was born December 3, 1951, in Perry, Oklahoma one of six children born to Ivan K. Grant Sr. and Grace Sherwin Grant. Joyce was a difficult birth being a breach birth. She often laughed about coming into this world ass backward and has been ever since. She was raised on a farm outside Red Rock, OK and attended Red Rock School graduating May 1971. In June 1971, she attended Guthrie Job Corp for Women where she earned 5 certificates to be able to support herself. She graduated in June 1973 and moved to Evanston, IL to live with her sister Sandra. Shortly after she got a job at St. Frances hospital working night shift. There she met her future husband, Robert “Bert” Collier. She worked there until 1975 and moved to Tulsa to go to nursing school. Shortly after Robert went to visit Joyce in Tulsa. This would start a whirlwind long-distance romance, which led to marriage on October 10, 1979, in Tulsa, OK.

Now married they returned to Evanston and worked at Evanston Hospital. In 1985 Joyce began taking classes at Harold Washington City of Chicago College. She earned an Associate Degree in Science with very high honors. She achieved her goal by working the night shift while going to school. She graduated in June 1988.

After graduation she accepted a position working in the outpatient dept. as head dental assistant. She often assisted attending dentists in surgery during pediatric dentistry.

In 1992, Robert and Joyce bought a home and moved to Geneseo to be closer to family. She worked at Geneseo Good Samaritan Nursing Home for 3 years. In 1997, she started doing home health care for Genesis Hospital and later transferred to food service where she worked 18 years retiring in 2015.

Joyce loved retirement where she could read to her heart content. Staying at home puttering in the yard or working on her genealogy, she loved fishing and enjoyed teaching her great nephew and great niece, Rob and Elizabeth how to fish. She also enjoyed watching television, catching up on FB with friends, and playing games on the computer, phone, and Gameboy.

The most important thing to Joyce was her Christian Life and family. She would do anything for you all you had to do was ask. She was a member of St. Mark’s Anglican Church in Silvis.

On May 24, 2018, she lost the love of her life and soulmate, Robert to cancer. In her own words I’ve only lived on to reunite with him and all her pets she so loved.

Those who proceed her in death are her parents, husband, Robert, three sisters, Romona Townsend, Sandra Wilson, MaryJo Ward. She leaves behind 2 brothers, Ivan Keith and Rodney Grant, both of Sallisaw, OK. Brothers-in-law, David Collier (Nadine) and Cliff Shore, and a whole slew of extended family that she claimed her own, especially her Godson, Robert Shore, great niece Elizabeth Pyle and her feline companion “Baby”.

Until we Meet Again…Christ Peace