Evelyn "Evie" Harshman Hutchison, 69, beloved sister, wife, mother, and "Mimi" to her grandbabies, passed away on October 7, 2020 after a short battle with cancer. Named after a favorite aunt, Evie was born on December 19, 1950 in Tulsa, the first child of Stanley Jennings Harshman and Marilyn Humphrey Harshman. A proud "daddy's girl", Evie adored her father, mother and younger siblings, Judy and Johnny. Following graduation from Edison High School in 1968, Evie attended Texas Christian University in Forth Worth, Texas, where she pledged the Texas Delta chapter of Pi Beta Phi and made many lifelong friends.
In 1969, while at home from college for Thanksgiving, Evie met her best friend and soulmate, Danny Hutchison. Dan was a student at the University of Tulsa at the time. After watching Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid with Evie on a blind double date, he was quickly smitten, and spent every following weekend he could spare in Fort Worth. Eventually, Evie transferred to TU and the two were married on January 7, 1972.
Following graduation from TU with her B.A. in Spanish in 1972, Evie obtained her M.A. in History from TU in 1974. She taught history at Tulsa Community College and Cascia Hall Preparatory Academy and later, while raising three children in a busy home, acquired her J.D. from TU College of Law in 1992. As a scholar and educator, she championed higher education for women, and was enormously proud to have a mother and two grandmothers who had graduated from college at a time when that was exceedingly rare. Following law school, Evie practiced law for several years before eventually discovering her true vocation as a professor of Legal Writing & Research and Family Law at the TU College of Law in 2001. Evie became Director of TU's legal writing program, served on multiple committees and received numerous awards for her teaching, including the University of Tulsa Outstanding Teaching Award for 2013-2014. Evie treasured her students and friends on the TU faculty. She was also active in the community, serving on the board of Tulsa Lawyers for Children and staying active in her local Pi Beta Phi alumnae chapter.
Despite her educational and professional accomplishments, Evie's true passion in life was her family and friends. Danny and Evie spent 48 years creating a marriage, a life and a family based on love, laughter, and very loud conversations. To be invited into the Hutchison home was to be welcomed into that family. For years, their house in South Tulsa was filled with the sounds and chaos created by their three children, Amy, Matt, and Tom, and enumerable friends. Many of those friends considered Evie to be a second mother. Once the children were grown, the same house became a playground for Poppy and Mimi's many grandchildren and the center for every family holiday. Evie was a hero to her children, and Danny and Evie's relationship and devotion to one another served as a model for their children in their own marriages. She was the true definition of a matriarch, and the rock upon which the family has been built and will continue to grow in future generations.
Evie loved board games and cards (and was highly competitive), going to movies with friends, dinner and drinks with good conversation, antiques and history, shopping (particularly with her sister, daughter and granddaughter) and traveling (especially to London and Paris). She was a terrible driver but good at pretty much everything else. In a highly partisan time, she had many liberal and conservative friends, and loved and was able to engage constructively with all of them. She was proud of her children, grandchildren and their accomplishments, and would tell anyone who cared to listen (and some who didn't) about them. Brilliant, compassionate and charismatic, anyone who knew her well would describe her as one-of-a-kind.
Evie was predeceased by her parents and aunt, Evelyn Holden of St. Petersburg, Florida. She is survived by her husband, Dan, sister Judy Ruble and brother-in-law David Ruble of Destin, Florida, nephew J.B. Ruble and wife, Leslie Ruble of Portland, Oregon, brother John Harshman of Tulsa, daughter Amy Quimby and son-in-law Mike Quimby of Bixby, son Matt Hutchison and daughter-in-law Caron Hutchison of Austin, Texas, son Tom Hutchison and daughter-in-law Lindsay Hutchison of Tulsa, and her grandchildren, Cate and Cooper Quimby, Anne Carter, Thomas and McCord Hutchison, and Alexandra and Daniel Hutchison.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Evie's family is having a private memorial service on Tuesday with the interment of ashes at Memorial Park following, but when circumstances permit, will be hosting a celebration of life for her extended family and numerous friends to celebrate someone who was larger than life. The family has established the Evelyn Harshman Hutchison Scholarship Fund in her memory at the TU College of Law and requests that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Fund in her memory. Mimi, we love you and will miss you forever. Moore's Southlawn 918-663-2233 share memories at www.moorefuneral.com