Joan Elizabeth Wallin, age 79, of Sioux City, Iowa, died of cancer on Tuesday, May 13, 2008 at her residence.

Funeral services for Mrs. Wallin will be held Saturday, May 17, 2008 at 10:30 a.m. at St. Mark Lutheran Church in Storm Lake, with Reverend Connie Spitzack officiating. Interment will be at 3:00 p.m. that afternoon in Memorial Park Cemetery in Sioux City. The Fratzke & Jensen Funeral Home in Storm Lake is in charge of the arrangements.

Friends may call from 6:00 p.m. until 8:00 p.m. on Friday, May 16, 2008 at Fratzke and Jensen Funeral Home in Storm Lake, where the family will be present.

In lieu of flowers, the family has established a memorial in Joan’s name.

Joan was born August 12, 1928 at home in Porter, Indiana, the daughter of Alec F. and Esther M. (Anderson) Carlson. She was baptized and confirmed at Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Porter. At the age of 9 years, Joan lost her parents and went to live with her aunt and uncle.

She married the Reverend Dr. Ralph Albert Wallin on December 27, 1950 in Chesterton, Indiana. He was the love of her life for 47 years and has been sorely missed these last eleven years of her life. Joan graduated from Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois in 1950, where she received an A.B. degree. She received her M.A. degree in special education from Morningside College in Sioux City in 1980.

Joan taught school in various places, including Moline, Illinois, Thunder Bay, Ontario, and Chicago, Illinois. While living in Sioux City from 1977 to 1987, she first taught school in Winnebago, Nebraska, and then at West Middle School in Sioux City. After moving to Storm Lake in 1988, she taught at the Fonda Community School in Fonda, Iowa, before retiring in 1994.

Joan was a member of St. Mark Lutheran Church in Storm Lake until recently, when she relocated to Sioux City, transferring her membership to St. Mark Lutheran Church there.

Joan was actively involved in many organizations, committees, clubs and volunteer work. She loved to entertain, travel, garden, read, play board games and complete cross-word puzzles. She cared deeply about education and was an advocate of special needs children. She will be greatly missed.

Survivors include two sons: Dr. Stephen and his wife, Dr. Marta Wallin, of Pueblo, Colorado, and Ronald Wallin of Sioux City; a daughter and her husband, Rebecca and Richard Schwartz, of Sioux City; six grandchildren: Sylvia and Bruce Wallin, Crissy Schwartz-Dangerfield, Michael and Leah Schwartz, and Brandon J. Grant; two great-grandchildren; a sister-in-law, Elaine Carlson, of Des Moines, Iowa; and several nieces and nephews.

She was preceded in death by her parents, husband, brother, and the “sister of her heart”, her cousin, Marion P. Sperry.