Margaret “Peggy” Louise (Springer) Horton

Margaret “Peggy” Louise (Springer) Horton, was the only child to parents Clair Thomas Springer and Margaret Louise (Noble) Springer. Born on February 28th, 1947, she spent her entire childhood, college years, and first years of marriage in Tucson, Arizona. She attended Saints Peter and Paul Catholic elementary school and Salpointe Catholic High School. Attending college at the University of Arizona, she met the love of her life, another only child from a small agricultural community in southwestern Kansas, Kenneth Fredrick Horton. They were married on August 26th, 1968. After graduating from college, Peggy taught at Erickson Elementary School as an English teacher while Ken finished college and tried his hand at living in the city. The call of the prairie and the pull of the farm, however, brought Peggy and Ken back to Elkhart in 1972.

From the time that Peggy came to Elkhart, she took to it with all her heart. She learned all there was to know about the history of Elkhart, the history of her new Horton family, and what it meant to be a farmer’s wife. In 1975 with the birth of their first child, Amy Joanne, Peggy began a new life as a stay-at-home mom. Always a teacher at heart, Peggy turned to volunteer as a way to stay busy. Over the years she was a Girl Scout leader (both locally and joining regional councils), Cub Scout Den Mother, CCD teacher, Director of Religious Education, VBS teacher and coordinator, and a member of the Prayer Group, church choir, PEO, the Daughters of Isabella, Morton County Democrats, and so much more. Three more children, Stacie Lynne (1978), Thomas Fredrick, and James Fredrick (1983) continued to keep her busy, hauling children and friends to dance lessons, gymnastics lessons, swimming lessons, piano lessons, Gospel Express Choir, school field trips, room mother parties and activities, and again so much more. She did all this while continuing to support her husband on the farm.

Instilling a love of traveling in all her children, summers were filled with long and short trips across the country stopping in every museum, known and unknown, to learn and experience both local and national history. She kept kids occupied with car games and sing-alongs and frequent stops where even fun excursions were about learning – White Sands, New Mexico; Meteor Crater, Arizona; Old Tucson, Arizona; Gettysburg Battlefield, Pennsylvania; Crazy Horse Monument, South Dakota; Epcot Center, Florida; Bent’s Fort, Colorado, and hundreds more. All trips were well documented, first through photos and 8mm movies, then a suitcase-sized VHS Camcorder, then a handheld camcorder, then a digital camera, and finally with her very own iPhone. It was well-known that if there was an event to be documented and Peggy Horton was in attendance, pictures were (and expected) to be taken.

Peggy never lost her connection to the classroom. She first got back into education when she was elected to the Elkhart school board, serving 12 years, several of them as president of the board. She slowly returned to the classroom through long-term sub positions and volunteer work with the high school musicals, and then finally as a high school English teacher. Restless as always, she applied for a new grant program and started the beginning of what continues now as the CATS program, then called the 21st Century. Serving as its director for several years, she took a break from the classroom, only to return to the English classroom after 8 years, while still serving as the CATS program director. As a teacher, Peggy also coached Forensics, helping several students, including her son James, to state competitions. Over the years, she also sponsored the National Honor Society, the junior class, and the senior class.

Before the whole world was rocked by COVID-19, Peggy broke both her legs in December 2019 and spent her final months as a teacher in a locked-down hospital room and finally at home surrounded by her family of teachers, where she retired from teaching in May 2020.

Three of her four remaining years were spent at home regularly surrounded by family, until May 2022 when she moved to Topeka, Kansas, after a significant fall at home. She remained there until her passing on April 8th, 2023.

Peggy is preceded in death by her parents Clair Thomas Springer and Margaret Louise (Noble) Springer, as well as her in-laws Thomas Fredrick Horton and Dorothy Mae (Gillespie) Horton. She is survived by her husband Kenneth F. Horton, her four children Amy Joanne Horton, Stacie Lynne (Horton) Adams and Steven, Thomas Frederick Horton and Liz, and James Frederick (Horton) Bryton and Shayna, and her five grandchildren Alphred Clair Adams, Grayson Fredrick Adams, Abigail Noble Horton, Annamae Noble Horton, and Andrew Fredrick Horton.

Rosary will be Thursday, April 13, 2023, at 7:00 PM at Garnand Funeral Home in Elkhart. Funeral Mass will be Friday, April 14, 2023, at 10:00 AM at St. Joan of Arc Catholic Church in Elkhart with Reverend Rudin Din officiating. Interment will follow at the Elkhart Cemetery. Visitation will be from 2:00 PM until 7:00 PM Thursday, April 13, 2023, at Garnand Funeral Home in Elkhart. In lieu of flowers, memorials can be made out to C.A.T.S. After School tutoring and enrichment program in care of Garnand Funeral Home, PO Box 854, Elkhart, KS 67950. Condolences may be posted at www.garnandfuneralhomes.com.