NOLTE, Ruby A. 1917-2009

NOLTE, SORENSON, KRISTIANSEN

Posted By: County Coordinator
Date: 8/12/2009 at 22:24:36

OSAGE, IOWA -- Ruby A. Nolte, age 92, of Osage and formerly of Clear Lake, died Saturday, August 8, 2009, at Mitchell County Regional Health Center Hospice Unit, in Osage, of pneumonia.

Funeral services will be held at 10 a.m. Tuesday, August 11, at the Champion-Bucheit Funeral Home in Osage with the Rev. Dennis Hanson officiating. Burial will be at the Clear Lake Cemetery in Clear Lake.

Visitation will be from 5 to 7 p.m. today at the Champion-Bucheit Funeral Home in Osage.

On March 9, 1917, Ruby Nolte was born in Clear Lake to Danish immigrants, Neils and Laura (Sorenson) Kristiansen. She was Christened Ruby Alexandra Kristiansen in the Clear Lake Lutheran church. Ruby spoke Danish before she began country school in Wayne Township near McIntire.

In 1934 she graduated from Riceville High School with a certificate in normal training, after which she taught for a year in a country school west of McIntire before marrying Kenneth Sprung. They lived on a farm northeast of LeRoy, Minn., where three of their four children were born.

They then moved to a farm south of Riceville in Jamestown Township. Afterward, they lived in Marshalltown and then in McIntire where they bought the general store. Ruby was the storekeeper for about 14 years. They moved to Charles City. In 1969, Ruby graduated from North Iowa Area Community College as a LPN. She worked several years at Faith Lutheran Home in Osage.

Ruby married Ben Nolte and they lived in Clear Lake until his death in 2001. They were winter Texans in the 1980s and early 1990s. They loved to dance and travel.

Ruby is survived by her daughter, Janice (Don) Gratz of Northridge, Calif. and their two daughters and five grandsons; daughter, Joyce (Joel) Sprung Chirino of Mexico City, Mexico, and their four children and nine grandchildren; son, Jerry Sprung of Detroit, Mich. and his son and five grandchildren who live in Cambodia; sister, Virginia (Earl) Grace of Riceville and their children Laura, Mary and Doug; and Laura's daughter Mary Beth Armstrong; nephew Ernie (Karen) Schofield of McIntire and their daughter Kristian; and her childhood friend Theo Lambert.

She was preceded in death by her son Kenny Sprung; two sisters, Connie Schofield and Mable Hackbart; and husband Ben Nolte.

Champion-Bucheit Funeral Home, Osage, 641-732-3706.

[Published in the Globe Gazette, 8/10/2009]