Ina R. LaMar Houghtaling, 82, of Hazleton, departed this life peacefully Friday, September 13, 2013, at St. Mary’s Medical Center in Evansville. 

She was born on July 7, 1931 in Washington Township, Gibson County, Indiana and was the youngest and last surviving of six children born to Hobart and Venus (Turpin) LaMar.

A 1950 graduate of Hazleton High School, she and Norman “Tom” Houghtaling of Lawrenceville, Illinois, were married on May 23, 1950 at St. Francisville, Illinois. They resided in Lawrence County, Illinois on his family’s farm near Billett, moving to Hazleton in 1953 and to their final residence in 1960. 

Ina loved drawing and painting, sewing for her children, and knitting and crocheting for her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She had been an active member of the Hazleton PTA and the Ladies Auxiliary of the Hazleton American Legion Post, and was a founding member of the White River-Washington Township Boys Baseball League Boosters and the Citizens for Tomorrow organization of Hazleton. When her children were grown, she was employed at Taylor’s Super Value in Princeton, in the deli department. 

Ina was preceded in death by her husband of 57 years, Norman “Tom” Houghtaling in 2008; her parents; brothers, Ellsworth, Lester and Chester LaMar; sisters, Eva Grace LaMar and Martha Jane Warner; and a granddaughter, Michelle Lynn (Scroggins) Goebel in 2012. When asked recently to share how she had coped with losing her parents, all of her siblings, her husband and a granddaughter, she paused briefly and responded, “Well, you just do it.” 

Survivors include her daughters, Terry (Travis) Nolcox, Nancy (Michael) Backes, Arletta Robinson, Carol (David) Taylor, Patsy Ricketts, and Sandra (David) Griesemer; a son, William Thomas Houghtaling; grandchildren, Lyle Nolcox, Shelley Manns, Angela Evans, Stephanie Wittmer, Jennifer Meyer, Natalie Taylor, Gabriel Hoover, Rachel, Melissa and Michael Taylor, David, Andrew and Eliot Graham, Emma and Alex Ricketts, Mamie Kester, Bethel Renfrow and Hannah Sparks; 24 great-grandchildren; and a special brother-in-law, Randel (Ellen) Houghtaling. 

Funeral services will take place at 2 p.m. Thursday, September 19, 2013 at Colvin Funeral Home, 425 North Main Street, Princeton, IN 47670, with Ina’s nephew, Sam LaMar, and son-in-law, Rev. David Griesemer, officiating. Burial will follow at the Hazleton Community Cemetery. 

Visitation will be from 4 until 8 p.m. Wednesday, September 18, 2013 and from noon until the service hour on Thursday at Colvin Funeral Home.