Services for Connie Claude Quiett, 80, of Ada are 10:00 a.m. Tuesday at the Covenant Cumberland Presbyterian Church, Rev. Linda Snelling will officiate. Burial will follow at Memorial Park Cemetery. The family will receive friends from 5:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. Monday at Criswell Funeral Home.
Connie Claude (Gerlach) Quiett of Ada, Oklahoma, passed from this earthly life, Tuesday June 7, 2016 in an Oklahoma City hospital surrounded by her husband, two children, and her pastor, Rev. Linda Snelling and husband Richard.
She was born March 13, 1936 to Donalita and Ervin Gerlach in Perryton, Texas. She attended Levelland High School and was Valedictorian when she graduated in 1953. She graduated from Baylor University in 1956 with a Bachelor of Arts in Music.
She married Ray Quiett in 1956 and they moved to Arlington Texas where she served as an elementary music teacher for 3 years. After moving to Oklahoma in 1959, she earned a Master’s degree in Music Education at East Central University. She became the music teacher for grades K through 12 at the Latta Public Schools. She retired from there after 25 years of service. During her tenure she became known for the excellent annual Christmas pageants and springtime choral revues. Her Junior High and High School choirs were persistent winners in state choral contests, often returning to Latta with multiple #1 ratings.
While at the Latta School, she became a prolific composer of high school choral music, and composed the inspirational chorale “White Wings” which one-year became the number one best seller in the choral music genre. Many schools and professional choirs nationwide have performed it, including a performance by the East Central University Chorale. She also created a musical for her elementary and middle-school choral groups based on the life of Thomas Edison.
A devout Christian, Mrs. Quiett was affiliated with the Covenant Cumberland Presbyterian Church where she served as choir/music director for over 25 years creating many special programs and numerous cantatas. She was known in the church as an excellent Bible teacher and scholar. She taught Sunday School and many mid-week Bible studies. Locally she worked with the Ada Public Library teaching adult literacy classes. She was extraordinarily creative and had a love for sewing. She shared her skills at quilt making with many groups. She loved sewing baby quilts for the newborn children of the church. At one time, while going through months of chemotherapy, she quilted 18 quilts which were donated to the children on the Lakota Indian Reservation in South Dakota.
She is survived by her husband, Dr. Ray Quiett; two children, Karry Quiett of Tulsa, and Karis Chastain, of Farmington, Arkansas; and two grandchildren, Jon Luke Rhoades, of Fayetteville, Arkansas and Phillip Connor Rhoades, of Farmington, Arkansas.
Bearers will be Randy Davidson, Ron Davidson, Roy Northcutt, Larry Young, Lynn Lofton and Brandon Bolin.
Memorials may be made to the Mission Fund of Covenant Cumberland Presbyterian Church, 15791 SH 1W, Ada, OK 74820.
Obituaries may be viewed and online condolences sent to criswellfh.com.
Criswell Funeral Home, Ada
