Miss Bush was the first of 11 children born to western Oklahoma pioneers John James and Anna Mae (Weaver) Bush. Her father, who descended on his maternal side from Revolutionary War patriots from Virginia, moved to the region from Alabama by way of Texas. Her mother, a former teacher whose own mother was said to have helped slaves learn to read, lived in Mississippi before moving to Oklahoma (then Greer County, Texas).
In recent years Miss Bush was interested in learning about her paternal grandfather, who immigrated from Schwaigern, Germany, in the early 1830's and died near Frazier before she was born.
Miss Bush grew up on the farm her parents homesteaded west of Altus. She lived for a number of years with her family in an earthen dugout. As the eldest child of a large family, she had many responsibilities at home and on the farm.
She graduated from Victory High School in Victory in 1926 and later attended Oklahoma A & M in Stillwater, where she also worked to pay her studies. During her adult working life she did farm labor, taught at Kay School north of Olustee, worked as a farm demonstration agent with the Oklahoma A & M Extension Services, worked at Charlie Dunn's Cafe across the street north of the First National Bank from the early 1950's until the mid-1960's and worked at Underwood's until her retirement in the mid-1970's. As a young woman, she traveled to Chicago alone by train to attend the 1933-34 World's Fair, an experience she liked to recall in her later years. Miss Bush remained single throughout her life, yet she often sacrificed her own freedom to provide care for others. One of her nephews, John Burleson, now of Indianapolis, Ind., describes his aunt Trudie as "second mother" who was at times his primary caregiver. Other friends and family recall her love for the outdoors and nature, for her irises and turnips and apricots and for the continuous stream of stray and needy animals whose needs she attended.
All remember her remarkable resilience and strength, her indifference to convention and her fierce independence.
She was loved and will be dearly missed.
Miss Bush is survived by two sisters, Beulah Gear of Oklahoma City, and Hazel Jepsen of Altus; one brother, Calvin Bush of Corpus Christi, Texas; 15 nieces and nephews and many great nieces and nephews.
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