Ardith Olson, age 81, of Volga, died Thursday, December 3, 2009, at Brookview Manor in Brookings. Funeral services will be 10:30 A.M. Tuesday, December 8, 2009, at First Lutheran Church in Volga, with interment in the church cemetery. Visitations will be from 5-8 P.M. Monday at Eidsness Funeral Chapel in Volga.

Ardith Gene (Young) Olson was born March 29, 1928, at Ashton, South Dakota, to Chester A. and Alvia (Alinder) Young. At age two she moved with her family to Morristown, South Dakota. She was the salutatorian of the Gettysburg High School Class of 1946. On December 19, 1948, she married Robert W. Olson at Morristown. She graduated from SDSU in 1950, with a degree in pharmacy and as a member of Rho Chi. The Olsons lived in Hills, Minnesota, where Ardith worked for a bank and as a school secretary. In 1961 the family moved to a farm near Volga. Ardith worked as the secretary at First Lutheran Church and then as an aide in the Title I program at Sioux Valley School for 13 years.

Ardith was a member of First Lutheran Church in Volga and the W.E.L.C.A. She taught and played the piano for Sunday School and Bible School, and headed the craft sales at the churchs annual Country Store for many years. She was very involved in the church quilting group. Besides quilting she enjoyed crocheting, doing crafts, and flower gardening. She was a 4-H Club leader for 13 years and a member of the A to Z Extension Club.

Survivors include her husband, Robert W. Olson, of Volga; four daughters: Patricia (Darrell) Seefeldt of Clark, South Dakota, Valerie Jackson of New Hope, Minnesota, Carolyn (Robert) Eide of Rosholt, South Dakota, and Julie (Timothy) Pelican of Modesto, California; ten grandchildren; one great-grandson; a brother, Loran Young of Tucson, Arizona; and a sister-in-law, Naomi Walling, of Wichita, Kansas. She was preceded in death by her parents; a son, Steven; two brothers, Milford and Myrle; and two sisters: Eleanor Young and Myrline Schliemann.