July 28 2018: TERHES, Joyce Lyons

The Honorable JOYCE LYONS TERHES

The Honorable Joyce Lyons Terhes of Silver Spring, MD, formerly Dunkirk, MD and Prince Frederick, MD passed from this earth on Wednesday, July 25, 2018. She was born June 21, 1940 in Dunkirk, MD, the fourth child of Mildred Ward Lyons and Arthur Gorman Lyons. She grew up in Calvert County. She was preceded in death by her loving parents and her brothers Robert and Gorman. Joyce is survived by her sister, Shirley Lyons Parker, her brother-in-law, John H. Parker IV, their four children John, Susan, Lesley and Nancy and her great nieces and nephews Robert Lyons, Katherine McRee Ford, Parker Elliott, Margaret McRee, Connor Elliott, Spencer Elliott, Hollin Keyser-Parker and Tristan Keyser-Parker.

She attended Calvert County Public Schools and later graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree from Mary Washington College of the University of Virginia.

She married the late Warner Paul Terhes.

For several years she taught government studies in middle and high school and in 1985 was named Outstanding Educator of the Year.

She is most known for her community activism where she served for more than three decades to promote conservative causes at the local, county, state and national levels. She was the first Republican woman elected to the Calvert County Board of Commissioners where she served two terms (1986-1994). She founded the Dunkirk Area Concerned Citizens Association. She served on the Advisory Council of the Republican Women’s Federal Forum for more than 30 years. Joyce was an active member of the Republican Women Leaders of Calvert County who dubbed her as “Maryland’s Iron Lady”. She was named Maryland Republican Woman of the Year for 1993. In 1996 she was named one of Maryland’s Top 100 Women by Warfield’s Business Record. She was elected Chairman of the Maryland Republican Party in 1989 and continued to serve until her retirement in 1998. In 2002, Joyce was elected as the Republican National Committeewoman of Maryland, where she served as a voting delegate for multiple Republican National Conventions. She was also elected to the Executive Committee of the Republican National Committee in 2005 and was reelected in 2007 and 2011. Joyce was also an active member of the Chevy Chase Republican Women’s Club where the Annual New Members Tea was named in her honor.

On the international front, Joyce traveled in 1995 to Moscow on behalf of the International Republican Institute where she conducted political seminars for leaders of Russia’s Democratic Choice National Campaign. In 2008, she conducted a campaign school for a group of Mongolian women visiting the United States as exchange students.

She retired after years of service to her community and resided in Silver Spring, MD with her beloved late West Highland Terrier, Winston Churchill. She continued to be an active presence in the Maryland Republican Party and often spoke at conservative events.

She was a loving daughter, sister, aunt and friend to many. She will be greatly missed.

Funeral services and a celebration of her life will be held at Oakdale Emory United Methodist Church in Olney, MD on Monday, July 30, 2018 at 1 p.m. with a reception following at Leisure World in the Overlook Building Party Room located at 3100 N. Leisure World Blvd., Silver Spring, MD. In lieu of flowers, please donate in her name to either the Wounded Warrior Project or to the Parkinson’s Foundation. A private burial will be held at the All Saints Episcopal Church in Sunderland, MD.

In lieu of flowers, please donate in her name to either the Wounded Warrior Project or to the Parkinson’s Foundation. A private burial will be held at the All Saints Episcopal Church in Sunderland, MD.

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