Ann Kerndt 1956-1976

KERNDT, AHERN, HIGGENS, NACHTWEY, HAAS, REYNOLDS, PHILBINBOSTON, SOMSEL, RETHWISCH, CURRAN, LUSTER, MAUSS, KRAMER, OMALLEY, HEIDERSCHEIT, MANTERNACH, KLEIN, FUSCO, OUDERKIRK, PETERS, FRIEDLE, POWERS, MCBRIDE, HAWES, RASING

Posted By: Paul Moritz (email)
Date: 8/4/2010 at 07:03:18

ANN KERNDT KILLED IN PLANE CRASH
Mr. and Mrs. Tom Kerndt of Lansing received tragic news on Monday from the U.S. State Dept. that their daughter, Ann, 20 years of age, was killed in a plane crash in Guatemala.

Ann was among five persons traveling in a plane piloted by a Maryknoll missionary. There were no survivors. The Kerndt's son, Peter, also in Guatemala, was not on the plane as feared earlier.

Ann was working in the earthquake zone for Direct Relief Foundation of Santa Barbara, California. Funeral services are pending.

source: Allamakee Journal, Lansing, IA - Nov. 24, 1976
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Ann Kerndt, daughter of Mt. and Mrs. Thomas Kerndt of Lansing, was killed in a plane crash on November 20, 1976 while enroute to an agriculture and health resource project in Belen, a town in the Ixcan area of northern Guatemala. She was working with Direct Relief Foundation of Santa Barbara, California. Prior to her assignment in the Ixcan region, she had been working for the last three months as a medical assistant in Hospital de California in the town of San Juan Comalapa, Chimaltenango, in the Central Highlands of Guatemala, Central America, where her brother Peter , a medical student was also working. The Hospital was set up after the earthquake of last February by the Committee for the Relief of Guatemala, of San Francisco, California to provide assistance to part of the 85,000 injured, the one million left homeless, and the families of the 22,000 killed in the earthquake. The town of San Juan Comalapa was almost completely destroyed.

Four other passengers were also killed in the crash. All were U.S. citizens. The plane was piloted by Father Bill Woods, a Maryknoll priest who had been working in Ixcan region of Guatemala for over 15 years. The other passengers were Dr. Michael Okada of Minneapolis, Minnesota, who had also worked at the hospital in Comalapa; Selwyn A Puig, a social worker; and John Gawker, an architect for the Ixcan project. There were no survivors.

Ann, age 20, was born March 10, 1956 in LaCrosse, Wisconsin. She was the sixth child of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Kerndt, one of 10 children. She attended I.C. Grade School and St. George High School, Lansing, Iowa, graduating from high school in May of 1973. She attended the Instituto Mexicano Regina, Mexico City, Mexico, in 1974, and the Universidad de Las America, A.C. Puebla, Mexico, in 1975. In the fall of that year she returned to the United States and attended one semester at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, where she was majoring in Spanish. In February of this year, she volunteered to work for Direct Relief Foundation in the project in Guatemala.

Funeral services were held on Saturday, November 27, 1976, at 11 a.m. at I.C. Church in Lansing, Iowa. The wake took place at the Kerndt home. Pallbearers were her sisters and brothers, Trish, Kathy, Gus, Tim, Peter, Margaret, Susan, Gretchen and Jim. Honorary pallbearers were Tom Boston, Anne Beth Somsel, Linda Rethwisch, Mary Ellen Curran, Tom Luster, Frank Mauss, Scott Kramer, Ann O'Malley and Julie Heiderscheit. The main celebrant of the Mass of the Resurrection was Ann's uncle, Father Matthias Kerndt, O.C.O.S.O. of New Melleray Abbey, Dubuque, IA. Others celebrating the Mass were Father William, also of New Melleray Abbey; Father Manternach of Lansing; Father Karl Klein of Clermont; Father Paul Fusco of Gary, Indiana; Father Paul Ouderkirk; Father John Peters, Msgr. Francis Friedle; Father Bill Powers; Father Jim McBride; Father Donald Hawes and Father Linus Rasing.

The funeral liturgy was prepared by Ann's father; her uncle, Father Matthias Kerndt; her parents, her brothers and sisters, and her two brothers-in-law, Patrick Ahern of Washington D.C., husband of her sister Trish, and Michael Higgens of St. Paul, Minnesota, husband of her sister Kathy. All participated in the ceremony. Among the readings chosen by the family were scriptural passages, the reading 'On Children' from "The Prophet" by Kahill Gibran, the Gestalt Prayer, excerpts from Ann's letters home, and a poem written by Marta Velez, a Columbian student living with the Kerndt family. Marta read the poem in her own language, Spanish. A homily letter written by her brother, Peter, who had been with her in Guatemala, was read by him at the funeral service. Music for the liturgy was provided by Mark and Michael Dunn, sons of Dr. and Mrs. Paul Dunn of Oak Park, Ill.

Out of town relatives of the Kerndt family who attended the funeral services were Dr. and Robert Nachtwey, their son James and daughters, Mary Louise, Katie and Julie, all of Springfield, Illinois; Mr. and Mrs. Fred Nachtwey of New York City; Mr. and Mrs. George C. Haas of Los Angeles, California; Mr. Earl Reynolds of Chicago, Illinois; Dr. and Mrs. Paul Dunn and family of Oak Park, Illinois; and Mr. and Mrs. John Fay Philbin and family, also of Oak Park, Illinois.

The family prefers that expressions of sympathy be in the form of memorial donations to the "Committee for the Relief of Guatemala-Hospital California" to continue the work that Ann was doing.

source: Allamakee Journal, Lansing, IA - Dec. 1, 1976