Maxine Elizabeth Keller Honaker 1923-2010

HONAKER KELLER

Posted By: Connie Swearingen (email)
Date: 2/20/2011 at 21:43:53

Sioux City Journal
15 June 2010

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..SIOUX CITY -- Maxine Honaker formerly of Sioux City passed away Saturday, June 12, 2010, in Denver Colo. following a long illness.

Services will be held at 10:30 a.m. Friday at Bethany Lutheran Church in Cherry Hills, Colo.

Maxine Elizabeth Keller was born Sept. 25, 1923, in Petersburg, Neb., to John and Francis Keller. She was the fourth of six children who spent the bulk of their childhood on a farm near Humphrey, Neb.

Upon graduation from high school, Maxine received a scholarship from the Sisters of Mercy to attend nursing school at St. Joseph's Hospital in Sioux City. With a talent for clinical work, she was encouraged to become one of the first nurse anesthetists in the nation with her training at Mercy Hospital in Detroit Mich., during the war years. She returned to Sioux City and began her career as a nurse anesthetist as St. Joseph's.

She married William (Claude) Black in 1951, and had two daughters, Mary Francis and Sue Ann several years later. During the 1960s and 70s, Maxine had a busy career rising to department head for anesthesia and along with many of her accomplishments she administered the anesthesia for the first open heart surgery in the state of Iowa. The head of the Sisters of Mercy also travelled to Sioux City so that Maxine could be her anesthetist for her surgery. Her husband, Claude, passed away in 1975.

In 1981, Maxine married Benjamin S. Honaker in Sioux City. They lived there several years and then moved up to Spirit Lake, Iowa, where Maxine spent the last 10 years of her career delivering anesthetics at Dickenson County Hospital. Maxine and Ben very much enjoyed the resort life-style at Lake Okoboji. After serving as a medical professional for 48 years, Maxine retired and enjoyed several years active in the Newmar Motor Home Club and with their home base in Colorado.

Maxine and Ben settled permanently in Centennial, Colo., in 2004. In recent years, she was active as a volunteer in the library at Willow Creek Elementary School and as a parish nurse at Bethany Lutheran Church. They enjoyed the Young At Heart Group as well "XYZ" (Xtra Years of Zip) community.

Maxine is survived by her husband, Ben; sister, Jeannie and brother-in-law, Dick Wolf of Omaha; daughters, Mary and Sue; stepdaughters, Beth and Becky; their spouses; and 10 grandchildren.