Alma Phibbs Heisey

away on May 25th 2025 while under hospice care. Alma was born in 1933, in

Pulaski, VA to parents Willie McDonald and Alma Irene (Horton) Phibbs. Alma

was married to the late Clarence C. Smith and later married to the late John C.

Heisey. She is survived by her daughter Sharon Cole of Middletown, PA and

her son Gary W. (Melanie aka Mindy) Kitchen of Elizabethtown, PA. Alma had

step-children (who are delineated for future generations since Alma didn’t

view any differences between half-siblings, steps of any variety, in-laws, etc.):

JulieAnn (Eddie III) Keith of Steelton, PA, John (Bernie) Heisey of Pittsburgh,

PA, Maripat Smith of Hummelstown, PA, Michael C. (Faith) Smith of Hershey,

PA, Debbie (Patrick) Hillard of Wilmington, NC, numerous grandchildren,

great-grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews.

Alma was the first daughter born to her parents after five sons and lost her

mother shortly after her birth. She then helped care for her three younger

sisters born to her father and the late Sylvara (Dalton) Phibbs. Alma graduated

from Bridgewater College with a major in Home Economics and a minor in

Chemistry. Her intention was to teach Home Economics in a rural school

much like the one she and her siblings attended. Instead she followed her first

husband, the late Otis Kitchen, first to Roanoke and later to Pennsylvania,

where she found using the chemistry degree was easier as there were simply

more open positions. She taught junior high in Roanoke, then upon relocating

to PA, went into early childhood education while taking courses for a Masters

Degree in Adult Education. Challenges led her to quit teaching but also

spurred a passion for advocating for disabled persons. Alma was one of three

people to be on the support staff for the PA State Conference on the

Handicapped that subsequently led to the National Conference for the

Handicapped under the late President Jimmy Carter. Many of these changes

are now incorporated into the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

(IDEA) that we have today. Her final working position was for a consortium of

higher education comprised of the University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania

State University, Temple University, Lebanon Valley College, and

Elizabethtown College.

Alma was fiercely proud of her family and they meant the world to her. An

anecdote that always amused people was that while being born and raised

down in the hills of the south-western corner of Virginia just below West

Virginia and close to Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virgina and North Carolina

she didn’t experience grits until moving to Pennsylvania in the mid 1960s.

When she was asked how that could be she would reply I wasn’t raised

southern I was raised hillbilly.

Alma was preceded in death by the aforementioned two husbands Clarence

C. Smith and John C. Heisey, her ex-husband Otis Kitchen, her son-in-law Tom

Cole, brothers Arby Phibbs, Paul Phibbs, Garnett Phibbs, Raymond Phibbs,

Donald (Donnie) Phibbs, and sisters Willadeane (Deane) Myers, Minnie Marie

(Marie) Ashley, Willie Ruth (Ruth) Phibbs, as well as a few nieces and

nephews.

Services will be held at the Palmyra Church of the Brethren, 45 N. Chestnut St.

Palmyra, PA 17078 on Saturday, June 14, 2025 at 3:00 pm. Internment will be

in a private family ceremony at the Elizabethtown Church of the Brethren in

the Peace Memorial Garden.