Colleen Carroll Trucke (Smith)

September 28, 1946 - January 19, 2014

Colleen C. Trucke, 68, of Independence died January 19, 2014 after a courageous struggle with cancer.

She was born in Westport, Oregon on September 28, 1946 and raised by Lloyd and Lucille Smith as an only child. Colleen spent most of her childhood growing up in Seaside, Oregon and finished off her adolescent years in Independence where she graduated from Central High School. She then continued on to earn a degree from Marret Davis School of Business in Salem, Oregon. It was in the spring of her last year of school when she was swept off her feet in a whirlwind romance and married only a short three months later on June 29, 1968 in Seaside, Oregon to the love of her life Rick Trucke, with who she spent the next 45 years loving each and everyday. Together they had two children, two grandkids and one great grandson.

After Colleen retired in 2011 after 22 years as a receptionist for Oak Hills Veterinarian Clinic in West Salem she turned her full attention to being the loving wife, mother and grandmother we will all remember her to be. Everyone who knew Colleen knew the joy her kids and grandkids brought her. She never passed up the opportunity to lavish her family with love. She was always there for every birthday, every sporting event, graduation, every important moment in their life. She was an extraordinary woman, wife, mother, grandmother, and great grandmother. For that she will be greatly missed and deeply loved by all who were close. Thank you Colleen for being such a beautiful part of our lives, your smile will be missed more than you could ever know.