Jacqueline Sue Tinsley

Jacqueline Sue (nee Gibler) Tinsley was born on January 22nd, 1955 at St. Mary’s Hospital in Jefferson City. Jackie had an idyllic childhood growing up in nearby Lohman, Missouri with two very loving parents, Richard and Jenetia Gibler and one brother, Glenn. Her maternal grandparents, Christian and Bessie Gemeinhardt lived close by and were great influences in her life.

After graduating from Cole County R-1, Russellville High School, she attended Lincoln University in Jefferson City. It was in her first semester at Lincoln that she was introduced to Tom Tinsley. After dating for a year, he asked her to marry him one evening by the spotlit fountain overlooking the Missouri River behind the Missouri state capitol building. They were married on August 16th, 1975 at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Lohman, MO.

They lived in Jefferson City for a few months before setting out to Fort Benning, Georgia for Tom to commence Infantry officer training. For Jackie, this began the adventure of being what was to become a military wife for the next 21 years began. They were stationed at installations like Ft. Benning, GA, Ft. Hood, TX, Ft. Polk, LA, Ft. Leavenworth, KS and assignments in central and also northern Germany. Despite training and deployments and long hours, this gave them an opportunity to see wonderful venues in Europe including the major cities of then West Germany, Holland, Austria and England. Jackie learned early on to apply the saying “Bloom where you are planted!”. After years of infantry unit assignments at Fort Hood, Texas and Germany they returned to Fort Benning, near Columbus, Georgia in 1981 where she continued taking classes at Columbus College and graduated Magna Cum Laude with a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Early Childhood Education in 1985. She was inducted into Kappa Delta Pi, an honor Society in Education Jackie worked in the field of education and administration during their many assignments. The many moves from state to state made it difficult to get full-time teaching certification. She substitute taught when called and during their assignment to Fort Polk, Louisiana she was offered the job as Director of the Fort Polk Child Development Center providing day care for up to 200 children each day. She received many Department of the Army Civilian awards for her leadership of the center and for working to attain their accreditation.

Following Tom’s retirement from the Army at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas they settled in Overland Park, Kansas in 1997. Jackie became interested in Interior Design and wanted to make a career change. She earned an AA degree in Interior Design from Johnson County Community College, Overland Park, KS and was employed in the field until her retirement.

In her younger years, Jackie enjoyed entertaining in their home, and found herself making meals for everyone from soldiers to family and friends. Having to set up many homes after moves, she used her accomplished sewing skills to create clothing and many home accessories. She also enjoyed needle arts like counted cross stitch and needlepoint. She loved touring model homes in Johnson County and also going to the many craft fairs in the area. She applied her knack for art, color, needlepoint, sewing and design to decorate their home for holidays. She particularly loved Christmas, Easter, the fall season.

While living in Overland Park, they became members of the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection at the Leawood Campus and joined a supportive “small group” of 10 other church members.

Jackie and Tom had no children, but were devoted parents to five “fur babies” (dogs) over the years. She felt that each one was one of God’s special creations and considered each one to be a family member.

Jackie and Tom enjoyed traveling and such places as Mexico, Germany, England, Holland, Canada, Hawaii, Oregon, New Hampshire, Virginia, and America’s National Parks were highlights of their adventures.

In the year 2020, she was initially diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease but that diagnosis was later revised to Multiple Symptom Atrophy. MSA, a rare and progressive degenerative condition related to Parkinson’s is a complex and challenging condition with no known cure. She was told her life expectancy was six to eight years from diagnosis. As the disease progressed, it affected every possible system and capability of her body taking everything from her. In October, 2025 she entered the University of Kansas Home Hospice program and was attended to by wonderful hospice nurses (Roseann, Shelly, Logan and Sheila) in her home as well as an amazing Visiting Angel, Yvette who provided excellent care for Jackie. The guest bedroom became her little hospital room with equipment provided by hospice. We are also appreciative to the great staff at the K.U. Med Hospice House that took care of Jackie for a week to give Tom a break. Tom and Jackie have been big advocates of Mission MSA whose stated mission is “To build a community where MSA care is robust, research is relentless, and hope is real”. https://donate.missionmsa.org/memorial.

Jackie feels very fortunate to have had wonderful, loving parents who valued going to church regularly and raising their children in the way God would have them to be. She was extremely blessed to have had loving, patient, devoted husband Tom for the last 51 years. She is survived by husband, Tom, her brother Glenn (Carma), Houston, TX, her mother Jenetia Gibler of Jefferson City, MO. and nieces Dr. Hayley Gibler-Williams of Shaker Heights, OH and Grace Gibler of Dallas, TX.

Services scheduled to honor Jackie are as follows:

A Celebration of Life will be held on Thursday, October 29 at 1:00 pm at the Wesley Chapel of the Church of the Resurrection at 13720 Roe Avenue, Leawood, Kansas 66224

A second service will be held at Jackie’s family’s church, St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in Lohman, MO on Wednesday, November 4th, at 4:00 pm. This service is added to allow family and friends who live in the Central Missouri (Columbia, Jefferson City, etc.) to celebrate Jackie’s life.