Lee, Agnes (Roen) 1917-2010
LEE, ROEN, TVEIT, VAKSDAL, WESELMAN, HANSON, BRAATEN-LEE, VINGE, DALE, WANGSNESS, BAKKE, SYVERSON, BROWN, DYRLAND, FINNEGAN, VORACHEK, JOHANSON
Posted By: Joy Moore (email)
Date: 10/24/2012 at 10:23:09
Agnes Lee, age 92, of Rochester, MN and formerly of Decorah, IA, died Sunday, February 21, 2010 Madonna Towers Nursing Home in Rochester, MN.
Funeral Services will be held at 11:00 A.M. Saturday, February 27, 2010, at Washington Prairie Lutheran Church in rural Decorah, Iowa, by Rev. Mark Kvale, with burial in the church cemetery.
Visitation begins at 10:00 A.M. Saturday, one hour before services, at the church. Fjelstul Funeral Home in Decorah is in charge of arrangements.
Having emigrated to the United States in 1905 and established a homestead in southern Saskatchewan in 1911, Hans Vilhelm Roen returned to Norway in the fall of 1912 and met Kristina Tveit. They were engaged. When Agnes visited Norway in 1967, an old neighbor said, "Vilhelm came back from America and won the nicest girl in Samnanger." The next spring he returned to Canada to prepare the farm for his bride-to-be. Kristina in the meantime attended a Husmorskole in Hardanger to prepare herself for homemaking. Finally, in the summer of 1916, William returned and they were married. Their first home was a teacherage at Bakken, which they shared with Kristina's father, who taught in Bakken during the week and returned to his own gård and family on the weekends. This is where Agnes was born on April 14, 1917. Her brother Harold was born there, too, on August 17, 1918.
In 1919, William brought his new family to the new land. It was a hard voyage. They all suffered sea sickness, and Harold never recovered. He died soon after they arrived. Sad as that loss was, William and Kristina "settled down to a hard, short, but happy life together." Three more daughters were born to them: Herborg in 1920, Ranveig in 1922, and Kristina in 1925. All were delivered with the help of William's older sister Seselia, who lived nearby with her husband, John Vaksdal, and children. Eight days after little Kristina was born, Agnes watched her mother get up and then fall backward onto the bed. She called Seselia, who sent her to the barn to get William. They tried to revive her with strong coffee, but she did not respond. William rode 20 miles on horseback to call Dr. Brown, but when the doctor arrived, all he could do was confirm her death. A blood clot had moved to her heart. Agnes remembers her father sitting on a chair, saying, "My girls, my girls, what will become of my girls!" More than grief for her mother, Agnes felt a strong desire to comfort her father.
Of the long-term effect her mother's death had on the girls, Agnes writes, "We grew up thinking of our mother and brother in Heaven with Jesus. Therefore Heaven became very real to us; this helped us to grow up believing in and living for Christ. Father kept the memory of mother alive for us. We grew up with her as our ideal and with a desire to make her pleased with us. My greatest compliment was when Dad or someone else told me that I was like my mother. Her influence in our lives, though her years were few, was great; her 29 years left an imprint on many."
The first months after the death were spent at the Vaksdal home. Agnes attended school in Lake Alma, where she began to learn English. In June of 1925, William rented the farm out and brought his family back to Norway. The first year they lived at Samnoy in the home of William's sister Berta. The next two years they lived once again in the teacherage at Bakken. At Bakken, Agnes had her grandfather Knut as a teacher and then, when Knut retired, her uncle Mons. In 1928 Mons was married and needed the teacherage, so William decided to return Canada with his three older daughters. Three-year-old Kristina was left in the care of relatives. They would not see her again until 1947.
Since they had left, Lake Alma had become a thriving new town. Adjusting to a new language, new customs, and new friends was difficult for Agnes: "Our clothes styles were wrong, our hair styles were wrong. I at 11½ years started in the third grade. It was difficult to know where to place me; in some areas, I was completely ignorant, in math I was quite advanced. I know what discrimination is like. However, for me it was only a short-term experience. When I learned the language, I blended in quite well."
Pastor A. M. Vinge came to serve the Lake Alma parish in 1931. He organized a Luther League which met a real need for the young people. Under his leadership, the Roen girls, along with a whole new group of friends, experienced a new vitalization of their faith in Christ. With the help of a friend Agnes organized and taught Sunday School in their Nordalen Congregation. She was active in Ladies Aid at the age of 16.
Frustrated with not doing either her school work or the house work as she wanted to, Agnes quit school after the tenth grade against the advice of her father. She took a series of housekeeping jobs, ending with her tenure as a maid at the home of Mr. Westergaard, the Canadian Vice Consul for Norway in Estevan.
It was while she was working for the Westergaards that she met Milo Lee. He was a young pastor of the Macoun Parish which included Estevan. One Sunday evening, after the service was over, she thought he looked so alone up in front. So she went up to talk to him. Not long after he came to call on her. She thought it was a pastoral call. He suggested going for a ride. She asked if her friend Olga could come along. That happened more than once. He took a short vacation trip to Decorah early in January and wrote a letter to her proposing a more serious relationship. Upon his return they began dating (without Olga) and became engaged on February 15. They were married on June 12, 1939 at Immanuel Lutheran Church near Maxim, the only church building in the Lake Alma Parish.
Of her marriage Agnes writes: "Milo had grown up in Iowa, I in Saskatchewan in completely different circumstances. He was college and seminary trained; I had less than a high school education. Yet we had much in common. We both loved Christ and His Church, our priorities in life were similar, and we loved each other. We both were praying for guidance in the choice of life partners. We definitely think our Heavenly Father brought us together. Milo's strengths have helped my weaknesses; my strengths have helped his weaknesses. We are better people because of each other."
Six children were born to Agnes and Milo: Marvin (1940), Carol who lived only 20 minutes (1941), Lorna (1943), Dixie (1946), Arland (1949), and David (1958). After the Macoun Parish (1939-41), they lived and served in Hingham, Montana (1941-50), St. Louis, Missouri where Milo did post-graduate work at Concordia Seminary (1950-52), Renville, Minnesota (1952-1967), Leland, Iowa (1967-1977), Forest City, Iowa where Agnes worked as a dormitory head resident and housing coordinator for Waldorf College (1977-1978), rural Ridgeway, Iowa (1978-1985), and Decorah, Iowa (1985-1994). After Milo's death in 2003, Agnes continued to live in the Vernon Street house in Decorah until 2006, when she moved for a short time to the Aase Haugen Home and then to Madonna Meadows, an assisted living home in Rochester. In 2007, she moved to Madonna Towers, the nursing home where she lived until her death on Sunday, February 21, 2010.
"As thy days, so shall thy strength be," was a blessing borne out in Agnes' life. In the darkest moments of her life she felt the guiding and protecting hand of God. And so she found it natural to extend kindness to those who crossed her path—relatives and strangers alike. From the mothering God she learned to be a mother to all.
Agnes is survived by four children and twelve grandchildren: Marvin & wife Ruth of Hinton, Alberta, and their children, Krista, Erik & Grete; Lorna's children, Laura (Auburn WA) & Jay Weselmann (Raleigh NC); Dixie Hanson & husband Paul of Moorpark CA, and their children, Micah & Karin; Arland Braaten-Lee & wife Kristine of Alberta MN, and their children, Caleb, Gabriel & Jesse; David & wife Joy of Rochester MN, and their children, Corey & Daniel; and two great grandchildren: Kieran (Caleb's) and Amelia (Erik's); two sisters: Herborg Vinge & husband Alvin of Outlook, Sask.; and Kristina Dale of Lacey WA; 9 nieces and 2 nephews on the Roen side; three sisters-in-law: Hazel Wangsness of Decorah; Eloise Bakke of rural Decorah; and Elaine Syverson & husband Ardell of Decorah; 13 nieces and 5 nephews on the Lee side.
She was preceded in death by her mother, Kristina and father, William; husband, Milo; infant daughter, Carol; daughter, Lorna; brother, Harold; sister, Ranveig & husband Lloyd Twedt, brother-in-law, Ingvald Dale; parents-in-law, John & Ida Lee; sisters-in-law, Lilly & husband Lloyd Brown; Grace & husbands Roger Dyrland and Jerry Finnegan; Ruth & husbands Stanley Vorachek and Hilding Johanson; brother-in-law, Vernon and wife Marcy; and brothers-in-law Elmer Wangsness and Andrew Bakke.
Source: Fjelstul Funeral Home database
Washington Prairie Lutheran cemetery
Winneshiek Obituaries maintained by Bruce Kuennen.
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