Doris Jeanne Hornbrook passed June 19, 2020 at 5:57am after briefly battling complications from heart surgery. She was 88. Soft-spoken but resolute in her convictions – frail in later years, but still fiercely independent, Doris was a unique contrast between optics and substance.
She was born in Evansville on June 29, 1931, the daughter of Delmas Hornbrook and Mary Maag Hornbrook. As a child of The Great Depression, Doris was ever-frugal and always penny-wise, finding ways to create a life with meaningful abundance with very little and few possessions.
Doris was the eldest of four siblings: Robert “Bob” Hornbrook, Charmaine “Charm” Marlow and Charles “Charlie” Hornbrook. She attended F.J. Reitz High School and held myriad positions in the Evansville community including that of waitress at Schenk’s Royal Drive-In and Franklin Drugstore’s cafeteria and soda fountain, later working in the dietary department at Deaconess Hospital and retiring from Mead Johnson (Bristol-Myers) where she spent more than thirty years. Doris was deeply spiritual and a long-time member of Simpson United Methodist Church.
Most of all, Doris was kind and practiced a “no-strings attached” form of love. This theme was present in all aspects of her life including one final “gift” made as an organ donor to strangers in Indianapolis. She will be profoundly missed.
Doris is survived by her daughter, Kathleen (David) Miller of Evansville, grandson Jeffrey (Nina) Adelson-Yan of Hoboken, NJ, great-grandson Lucas “Luke” Adelson-Yan of Hoboken, NJ, great-granddaughter Delia Adelson-Yan of Hoboken, NJ, siblings Bob (Barbara) Hornbrook of Evansville, Charm (Tom, deceased) Marlow of Evansville and Charlie (Joann, deceased) Hornbrook of Boonville, IN and numerous nieces, nephews and cousins.
In lieu of flowers or donations, Doris would have asked that you simply practice the all too often overlooked act of being kind. Start with one unexpected and unsolicited act of kindness. As Rabbi and author Harold Kushner so eloquently stated, “When you are kind to others, it not only changes you, it changes the world.”
Condolences may be offered at www.AlexanderEastChapel.com.
