Shirley Kay Uhler

Funeral service for Shirley Uhler will be at 2 p.m. on November 19, 2024 at Gillette Memorial Chapel with Pastor Cory Young of United Methodist Church officiating.  Burial will follow in  Mt. Pisgah Cemetery. Shirley Kay (Keil) Uhler passed away peacefully surrounded by her family on November 7, 2024. She was born on June 9, 1949 in Rawlins, Wyoming to Herb and Mary Ellen Keil. Their family lived in Riverton and moved to Casper, Wyoming when she was two years old. She graduated from Kelly Walsh High School in 1967 and went to the University of Wyoming in Laramie. She moved to Washington, D.C. and worked for U.S. Senator McGee. She moved back to Denver to be closer to her family and worked for the Texaco Law Department there. In February 1974, she went on a blind date to a Merle Haggard concert and met Terry Uhler. She wasn’t very impressed with the country music, but she fell in love with the tall guy with the motorcycle from North Dakota and they were married in Casper, Wyoming on December 7 of the same year. After their wedding, she packed up with Terry and his white German shepherd and moved to Bowman, North Dakota where she worked at the local newspaper. They had their daughter, Jennifer Lee in 1977 and moved to Gillette, Wyoming in 1979 where their son Joseph Michael was born. Together with her husband Terry, she was a business owner in Gillette where they had a nursery and landscaping business, trucking company, and motorcycle dealership until they retired in 2011 as snowbirds in Yuma, Arizona. Shirley was active in her community and schools, in the American Business Women’s Association, as a Girl Scout and Boy Scout leader, and at the schools. She was a long-time member of the First United Methodist Church in Gillette. She loved riding her motorcycle with Terry through the Black Hills. She loved all animals and had many pets and dogs that were a big part of her life. More than anything, she loved life and her family. She was a great daughter, mother, grandmother, neighbor, and friend. She and Terry were partners and very best friends who had a beautiful life together everywhere they went. She is survived by her husband, Terry and her dog Lucky, her daughter Jennifer and husband Ulrich, her son Joseph and wife Janell, and grandchildren Carter, Kadence, and Cohen.