MARTIN, Ruth Elizabeth (WALSER) ZUEHLKE
WALSER, ZUEHLKE, MARTIN, STEHN, HOFSTRAND, JANICKE, BJERKE, MADSEN
Posted By: Sharon R Becker (email)
Date: 11/17/2016 at 14:36:49
Obituary ~ Ruth Elizabeth (Walser) Zuehlke Martin
September 02, 1913 ~ October 22, 2016The Globe Gazette
Mason City, Cerro Gordo County, Iowa
Tuesday, October 25, 2016, Page A8MASON CITY -- Ruth E. Martin, 103, of Mason City, died Saturday, Oct. 22, 2016, at the IOOF Home.
Funeral services will be held at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 27, 2016, at Wesley United Methodist Church, Mason City, with Pastor Travis Stevick officiating. Visitation will be from 5 to 7 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2016, at Major Erickson Funeral Home, 111 North Pennsylvania Ave. Interment will take place in Memorial Park Cemetery. Memorials may be directed to the Ruth Martin Memorial Fund in care of the Family.
Ruth was born Sept. 2, 1913, in the family farmhouse east of Northwood, Iowa. She was the only daughter of Peter Walser and Emma (Stehn) Walser. She attended school in Northwood and graduated near the top of her class in 1932 in the heart of the depression. She attended the University of Wisconsin for a semester returning home to help her ill mother. She graduated from Hamilton Business College in bookkeeping and worked for the Iowa Hardware Mutual Insurance Company in Mason City until her marriage to Walter Edmund Zuehlke on Sept. 20, 1944. They farmed southwest of Mason City for 28 years and had two children, Suzanne and Mark.
Ruth worked for many years as the secretary/treasurer for the rural Mason City School Board and in the forerunner of the Area Education Association. As a farm wife, she gardened, canned, and cared for her flock of over 2,000 chickens. She loved music. In her high school years she played leading vocal roles in musicals and later sang in many choirs. As an accomplished pianist, she often accompanied family members.
She was active in many organizations — Eastern Star, Wesley Methodist Church, Universalist Club, Oweso Club, Etude Club and Chapter KX of the PEO Sisterhood. She served as Chapter KX president and represented Mason City chapters at International in New Orleans.
Ruth, Walter, and family traveled by auto every August to many parts of the United States and Canada, and she flew twice to Europe. After Walter’s death, she moved into Mason City and in 1976 married Morris Martin. They built a home in Mesa, AZ, where they wintered happily for ten years and she learned to paint and play golf.
She lived in her Mason City house until her 93rd birthday. She moved to Homestead Assisted Living for a year before transferring to the IOOF Home in 2007. She lived to be 103 years of age due in no small part to the exemplary care she received there.
She was preceded in death by her parents, brothers Arthur and Ernest, her husbands Walter Zuehlke (1972) and Morris Martin (1985).
She is survived by her daughter Suzanne (Don) Hofstrand, Mason City, her son Mark (Sharon) Zuehlke in Maricopa, AZ, and step-daughter Ellen (Tim) Janicke in Sun City, AZ. 5 grandchildren: Guthrie (Rhana), Trapper (Rhoda), and Nicholas (Rachael) Zuehlke, Andrew (Yasmin) and Laura Hofstrand, and step-grandchildren Amy Bjerke and Aaron Madsen; 4 great-grandchildren: Jonah, Zachary, Zayden, and Dante Zuehlke and two step-great-grandchildren Jeremy and Lexie Zuehlke.
Arrangements are with Major Erickson Funeral Home and Crematory, Mason City.
Transcription by Sharon R. Becker, November of 2016
Cerro Gordo Obituaries maintained by Lynn Diemer-Mathews.
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