Joann Ruth (Powers) Walters, an educator and New London Local School District's first kindergarten teacher, died Oct. 3, 2011, in a Columbus nursing home. She was 83 and had been in declining health for several years. She was born March 30, 1928, at Bucyrus, the daughter of Fred. S. and Anna Mary (Souders) Powers, and grew up in Columbus, graduating from West High School in 1945. She met her first husband, James F. Walters, while they were attending Bowling Green State University and were wed in 1949. They moved to his home town of New London and taught across the hall from each other at North Fairfield elementary school. While she spent several years away from the classroom raising her children, she ran a private kindergarten in her home. When the district created its first K class in 1963, it had no room, so Joann taught morning and afternoon sessions in the Sunday school classrooms of the United Methodist Church. Among her students was daughter Jane who was admonished by one of her classmates: 'The teacher is Mrs. Walters, not Mommy!' In between cross-country summer family camping excursions, Jim and Joann earned master's degrees at Western Michigan University. In 1969, the family moved to Greenwich, where he became principal at South Central High School and she was hired by Willard Area Schools, first as a teacher at Richmond Elementary and then as an administrator. After Jim's death in 1973, she was employed as an administrator with the Richland County Department of Education. Joann married a fellow educator, Harold R. Hayden, in 1975, and the two lived briefly in Columbus before retiring to Florida, where they resided in Venice, Sarasota and Punta Gorda, and she wrote federal grant applications for Charlotte County. After their divorce, she lived in Goose Creek, S.C., for several years and had a brief marriage to Charles Oswald. Following that divorce, she lived with her daughter's family in Mulberry, Fla., and then moved to Columbus when her health began to deteriorate. She is survived by sons Jim F. Walters of Long Beach, Calif., and Joel D. Walters of Columbus, Ohio; brother James A. (and Pat) Powers of Hendersonville, N.C.; son-in-law Michael Shaffer; and grandchildren Anna and Payden Shaffer. In addition to her first two husbands, she was preceded in death by daughter Jane A. Shaffer. Calling hours will be from 4 to 8 p.m. Thursday (Oct. 6) at Eastman Funeral Home in New London. A graveside service will be held at 10 a.m. on Friday at Grove Street Cemetery in New London. The family requests that in lieu of flowers, memorial donations be made to the charity of your choice.