VanOtterloo, Rena (Mrs. Simon "Sam") 1905-1941

VANOTTERLOO, CLEVERINGA, VOGELAAR

Posted By: Lydia Lucas - Volunteer (email)
Date: 7/15/2022 at 08:01:14

From the Rock Valley Bee, February 14, 1941:

DEATH CALLS MRS. RENA VAN OTTERLOO
Funeral For Young Mother Held Monday

Funeral services were held Monday afternoon at 1:30 o’clock in the Christian Reformed church for the late Mrs. Simon Van Otterloo. Rev. H. J. Triezenberg conducted the services. Burial was at the Inwood cemetery where the young woman was laid to rest beside her late mother.

Born at Lebanon, this county, she went to school in Plato township and had spent practically her entire lifetime in this vicinity. On February 27, 1930, Simon Van Otterloo and Miss Rena, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Cleveringa, were married. On January 21, some three weeks ago, she was taken to the Lutheran hospital, Sioux City, where she passed away last Wednesday, February 6, at seven in the evening. A baby daughter, born prematurely on February 2 did not survive. The deceased was only 35 years, 7 months and 9 days of age.

A baby brother preceded her in death, on May 14, 1904, and also her mother who passed awy on Sept. 8, 1940. She is survived by her husband, father, 2 brothers, Nick, near Rock Valley, and Leonard, near Inwood, and by a sister, Ruth, of Inwood.

A Christian wife and mother, she has gone to her reward in Heaven. The entire community sympathizes sincerely with the bereaved family who feel their loss very keenly.

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RESEARCH NOTES

From the Sioux Center News, February 6, 1941: Graveside services were held Tuesday at Rock Valley for the baby of Mr. and Mrs. Sam Van Otterloo, which was born Sunday at Sioux City hospital. The five-month infant lived only a few hours. The mother is critically ill with kidney poisoning at this time.
Notes on the mother’s and baby’s deaths in other area newspapers also give her husband’s name as Sam.

Her death certificate (informant Roelof Cleveringa) has Mrs. Rena Van Otterloo, wife of Sam Van Otterloo; residence rural Sioux County, 2 miles west, 1-3/4 mile south of Rock Valley; born June 27, 1905 near Hawarden; parents Ralph Cleveringa, born in Holland, and Mary Vogelaar, born in Pella, Iowa; died in the Lutheran Hospital, Sioux City, where she had been for 2 weeks, I day, at 6:55 p.m. February 5, 1941; cause, adynamic ileus [bowl obstruction] and eclampsia; due to pregnancy (4-1/2 to 5 months); other conditions: influenza and acute pan sinusitis; major findings: “Pt. [patient?] aborted spontaneously”; buried in Inwood Cemetery.

Her FindaGrave.com page has Rena Cleveringa Van Otterloo; born 27 June 1905 at Lebanon, Van Buren County[??], Iowa; died 5 Feb 1941 at Rock Valley; buried in Richland Cemetery, Inwood. Parents Ralph K. Cleveringa (1879-1951) and Mary Vogelaar Cleveringa (1877-1940). Four siblings listed. Husband Simon John Van Otterloo (1906-1969, married 1930). There is a photo of her headstone, associated with the Cleveringa family stone: “Mother & baby / Rena nee Cleveringa / wife of Simon Van Otterloo / 1905-1941.” (His FindaGrave.com page shows him as Simon John “Sam” Van Otterloo; remarried in 1947 to Tena Rietema.)

The 1940 census also lists him as Sam. He and Rena are farming in Sioux Township, enumerated next door to his brother Clarence and family.