Bertie Ann Catlin Davis Trail

1927 - 2016

Bertie Ann Catlin Davis Trail 1927—2016
Bertie Ann Catlin Davis Trail, 88, died Monday, September 19, 2016, at the DeKalb Area Retirement Center in DeKalb, Illinois. She was born December 7, 1927, in Vinita, Oklahoma, the youngest of the six children of Herbert and Meda (Story) Catlin. She graduated from Vinita High School in 1945. She married Walter Dee Davis in June 1946. Together they had four children and were living in Tulsa at the time of his sudden death in May 1961. In September 1961, she moved herself and her children to Stillwater, Oklahoma and began her undergraduate career at Oklahoma State University. She graduated there in 1965, with a BS in Education, accepted a scholarship at the University of Chicago and moved with her children to Park Forest, Illinois. She received her Master's Degree in 1967, and moved again with her children to DeKalb, Illinois so that they could be with Stan Trail, to whom she was married in December 1966. Their son was born in February 1969. Two years later she completed her course work and preliminary exams in Chicago. Ann worked as an instructor in the College of Education at Northern Illinois University, as a classroom teacher in DeKalb and Belvidere and as a reading specialist in Belvidere before her retirement in 1991. In the early years of her retirement she enjoyed traveling to Alaska, the Caribbean, Great Britain, Hawaii and Italy. Ski trips to Austria, the Canadian Rockies, Utah and, most of all, to Colorado were great fun for her as well. She was a member of Westminster Presbyterian Church and the International Reading Association and served as a volunteer at Kishwaukee Community Hospital. For many years she was an enthusiastic participant in the senior water exercise program at the Kishwaukee YMCA and she helped with the establishment of the Children's Waiting Room at the DeKalb County Court House. Ann was a person of courage, compassion and kindness. Her infectious smile and, in her later years, her singing announced her abundance of good cheer. She was preceded in death by her first husband, her parents, her five siblings, her oldest child, Michael Dee Davis, and her youngest child, Jeffrey Allen Trail. She is survived by her husband of 49.75 years; daughters, Sally Davis of DeKalb, Candace (Richard) Reeves of Austin, Texas and Lisa (Vit) Stravinskas of Rockford; grandchildren, Michael Pipestone, Lena Parrott, Daniel Stravinskas, Matthew Stravinskas and M.E. Stravinskas; and many nieces and nephews.
The Memorial Service will be held at a later date. In lieu of flowers, memorials can be made to the Ann Trail Memorial Fund, addressed to the Trail Family in care of Anderson Funeral Home, P.O. Box 605, 2011 South Fourth Street, DeKalb, IL 60115. For information, visit www.AndersonFu neralHomeLtd.com or call 815-756-1022.