Jean Irene Kelley

She attended Fort Branch High School and was a very good student. She loved to jitterbug and had entered and won several dancing contest from Evansville to Shreveport, Louisiana.

Jean and her family moved to Kokomo in 1941. She worked at the American Hostess Restaurant and My Grill Restaurant where she met her first husband, Ed Bitner. They married on June 12, 1945. Jean and Ed had eight children, six girls and two boys. She was a very dedicated mother, and she liked giving back to her community by volunteering with the Ladies Auxiliary of the Civil Defense for several years. She married her second husband, Robert Kelley, in 1985.

She is survived by her children, Carolyn and her husband Lee Miller, Peru, Linda Sholty, Kokomo, Bonnie Nelson, Galveston, Debbie and her husband Bob Dishon, Kokomo, Margaret Bitner, Kokomo, and Eddie Bitner, Kokomo; fourteen grandchildren; and thirty great-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by both her first husband and second husband; her parents; son, Bill Bitner; daughter, Elaine Bitner; and grandchildren, Kenny Miller and Carrie Bitner.

Jean’s family would like to thank the staff at Golden Living Center and at Guardian Angel Hospice for the love they showed their mother.

The funeral service will be held at 1 p.m. Monday at Sunset Memory Garden Funeral Home. Entombment will follow in Sunset Memory Garden Cemetery. Visitation will be from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday at the funeral home. Messages of condolence may be expressed online at www.sunsetmemorygarden.com.