Barbara Leeper Goebel

1921 - 2020

Barbara Leeper Goebel

July 27, 1921 - Dec. 30, 2020

PORTLAND, Oregon - Barbara Leeper Goebel, formerly of Bloomington, Illinois, passed away at age 99 on December 30, 2020 in Portland, Oregon. She was born on July 27, 1921 to Arthur Lowell and Helen Brown Leeper in Cass County Illinois where her family had homesteaded five generations earlier.

In 1944 Barbara married William Mathers Goebel of Jacksonville, Illinois. While William served in World War II, Barbara worked in industrial training in Chicago at Bauer and Black, and at Time, Inc. where she was the Assistant Director of Training. After the war, the couple spent three years in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where William attended University of Michigan law school. They afterwards lived in Carmi, Illinois where William was a partner in the Conger, Elliott, Goebel and Elliott law firm, and in Clarendon Hills, Illinois while William was Assistant General Counsel of the Illinois Agricultural Association in Chicago. In 1961, the couple moved to Bloomington, Illinois, where William was for many years a partner at the Dunn Law Firm.

Barbara was educated in the Virginia, Illinois public schools, received her A.B. from Illinois College, her M.A. degree from Illinois State University, and her Ph.D from the University of Illinois. She retired in 1989 as a Professor of Psychology at Illinois State University where she had taught for 25 years. She was a member of numerous professional organizations, including the American Psychological Association, the Gerontological Society of America, the National Education Association, and the American Educational Research Association. She was a member of scholastic honorary fraternity Phi Kappa Phi and was listed in Who's Who in American Women, Who's Who in the Midwest, and Who's Who in American Science.

She was a member of the Second Presbyterian Church, where she had been a soloist and choir member, and of Chapter JV, PEO, where she had served as President. Through the years she had served on the boards of several local social services agencies. She frequently donated her services as a speaker for local schools, churches, hospitals, and charitable organizations.

She was preceded in death by her husband, William, and by a son, James Arthur. She is survived by her son, William Mathers Goebel, of Los Angeles, California; and daughter, Helen Elizabeth Goebel, of Portland, Oregon. Interment will be in Diamond Grove Cemetery, Jacksonville, Illinois.