Oasis Women's Center Mourns Loss of Executive Director Margarette Trushel
ALTON - Oasis Women’s Center has lost a force in the passing of Margarette Trushel, the center’s executive director for the last 40 years.
Trushel was part of the team of women who founded the shelter in the 1970s. She worked hard all her life to protect and support survivors of domestic violence. As the center grew, so did Trushel’s devotion to the community. She leaves behind a legacy of kindness.
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“She was whip-smart, stubborn as a mule, but she had a big heart and she worked incredibly hard all her life for this agency and for the community,” said Marcy Jacobs. “She was really fierce in her belief in this work and her belief that victims could be safe and that our community needed to change so that victims could be safe.”
Jacobs joined Oasis Women’s Center five years after Trushel. She has spent her career working with Trushel to advocate for survivors.
The original Oasis Women’s Center team “worked really hard” for two years before the shelter opened, fundraising and writing up the incorporation papers among themselves. The center ultimately opened its doors in 1978, and Trushel served as a volunteer before taking on the executive director role a few years later.
“They literally started with nothing,” Jacobs said. “She used to laugh and say the shelter, when it opened, was just eats and sheets, meaning it was a safe place to sleep with clean sheets and you got something to eat, and that was about it. And then over the years, the program has just grown and gotten a lot more focused on advocacy and helping people really get back on their feet.”
At Oasis, Trushel loved spending time with the kids who came into the shelter. She devoted many hours to reading to them, and to this day, her desk is still surrounded by hand-drawn pictures given to her by the kids.
Jacobs added that Trushel was “quite generous” with her employees, working hard to make sure they had benefits and retirement packages, which can be rare in nonprofit work. Jacobs joked that Trushel would “fuss at us” if her staff wanted to buy something expensive, but she ultimately never “questioned a penny” that went to helping survivors.
She was also a board member of The Intimate Partner Violence Intervention Project, served on the Operations Committee for the Illinois Coalition Against Domestic Violence, and was the chair of the Eva A. McDonald Women’s History Coalition in Madison County.
She was a member of the local Zonta chapter and worked with many social service organizations across the region. Throughout her life, she received the Jefferson National Award for Public Service, the Human Dignity Award from the Illinois Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the Peacemaking Award from the Presbytery of Giddings-Lovejoy, and the Liberty Bell Award from the Madison County Bar Association.
As Oasis Women’s Center and the broader Riverbend community cope with Trushel’s loss, Jacobs encourages people to remember her legacy as a staunch advocate for survivors of violence. She urges community members to think about how they can help others, just like Trushel did.
“What are you going to do for the next battered woman, battered child or battered man that you see? She always just wanted to bring it back to that,” Jacobs said. “I think she went above and beyond.”
Visitation will be held from 10 a.m. until the time of funeral service at noon on Saturday, June 21, 2025, at Anderson Family Funeral Home in Brighton. Burial will follow at Summerville Cemetery, where she will be interred next to her partner David Noles. Memorials may be made to Oasis Women’s Center.
To read Trushel's full obituary, click here.
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