Wanda Faye (McGee) Phillips, 90, Leawood, Ks. passed away April 7, 2013. Funeral services will be held at 2:00 p.m. Thursday, April 11 at Keystone United Methodist Church in Kansas City, Missouri, with visitation from 1:00-2:00 p.m. at the church. Burial will be in Orient Cemetery, Harrisonville. Memorial contributions may be made to The Keith Worthington Chapter of ALS Association.
Faith and family was important to Wanda Faye (McGee) Phillips, born August 13, 1922 to Christopher (Roy) and Katie (Van Camp) McGee in Johnson County, Missouri. When she was two years old, the family moved to her grandparent’s family farm in Cass county, near Harrisonville, Missouri. She was a middle child—a sister between two brothers—Lawrence McGee and George McGee. She attended First Baptist Church in Harrisonville where she professed her faith and was baptized at the age of 16. After graduation from Harrisonville High School, Wanda went to secretarial school in Kansas City and made that city her home. She worked for the Pratt-Whitney Defense Plant during WWII. She married H. D. Phillips in 1943 and lived in Macon, Georgia where he was stationed in the Army.
Many changes came about following the end of WWII which touched Wanda’s life. Her parents made a move from the family farm in Harrisonville to Belton, Missouri where her dad turned to carpenter work Though life in town offered more conveniences to her parents, her mother became ill and died at the age of 51. By this time her husband, who was in the European War Theatre in the Army, and her two brothers, away in the Navy, had returned. However, the reunion was short lived when her younger brother was killed in a plane crash as part of his Navy Air Reserve duty in 1948 as he was returning to Columbia, Missouri where he attended the University of Missouri.
As a mother, Wanda enjoyed being a homemaker for her two children. She was active in the PTA and became a Cub Scout Leader. She loved to sew, making many of her daughter’s dresses and then quilts for her children and grandchildren. She enjoyed a close relationship with her cousins and looked forward to picnic reunions with the Van Camps each summer. She was dedicated to the Methodist Church and taught Sunday school when her children were little. More recently she was a member of the Broadway Methodist Church in the Waldo area.
My mother was a resilient member of the Greatest Generation. She brought her own zest for life and faith for the unknown. She loved to tell stories of her life as a child on the farm; I’m sure so as not to forget the cherished time when her family was together. She endured not only the tragedy of WWII, but the tragedy of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) in her later years. Like the young soldiers before her, she fought the good fight. She was loved and she will be missed.
She is survived by her daughter, Cheryl McIntosh and husband, Ted, and their son, Martin E. Phillips and wife, Susan Sullivan; three grandsons, Phillip Hof and wife, Deidre, Nathan Hof and fiancée, Kelly Murphy and Jonathan Hof and wife, Johanna; one great-granddaughter, Luciana Hof, as well as a niece, Lou Anne Carder and family in Upland, California.
