Estela Corona Bern 1922 - 2016

BERN, DOMÍNGUEZ, CORONA

Posted By: Connie Swearingen - volunteer (email)
Date: 4/11/2016 at 16:46:46

Sioux City Journal
6 April 2016

SIOUX CITY | Estela Corona Bern, 94, of Iowa City, Iowa, gently passed away on April 4, 2016. She had resided in Sioux City for more than 40 years.

Celebration of Life and Christian service will be 4 p.m. Sunday April 17, at Full Circle Catholic Church (using New Song Episcopal Church at 912 20th Ave, Coralville, Iowa). The service will be officiated by the Rev. Mary Kay Kusner, Roman Catholic Woman priest and Full Circle pastor. Private burial in Sioux City will take place this summer. Her favorite poem was "At Peace" by Mexican poet Amado Nervo.

Maria Estela Corona Domínguez was born in Morelia Michoacán in Mexico in 1922. Until she was married, she celebrated her birthday on the 21st of March (the same birthday as Mexico's former president Benito Juarez—a national holiday). When she married, she needed to produce her birth certificate and it was then that she discovered her actual day of birth was the 27th of March. She celebrated both birthdays from then on.

Estela was the eighth of nine children born to Maria Domínguez and Francisco Corona. She was preceded in death by all her siblings, Luz Maria, Alfonso, Teresita, Francisco, a set of twin girls who died in infancy, Marie Elena, and Gloria. The family lived in Morelia until Estela was a teenager and then moved to Mexico City, where they lived next door to Francisco's brother, Gustavo, and his wife, Conchis and their seven children.

Estela graduated from the University of Mexico and also earned a degree in biology and bacteriology from the Polytechnical Institute of Mexico. She and her younger sister, Gloria, moved to Chicago to study nursing at Columbus Hospital/Loyola University. She graduated in 1946. After earning her R.N. she returned to Mexico and worked at the Cardiology Institute. She was awarded a Kellogg Foundation scholarship and moved to New York City where she earned a degree in 1951 from the Columbia University, Teachers College.

She turned down her parents' offer for a plane ticket home after graduation, and took the bus instead because she wanted to see the countryside. Half way home, during a bus transfer, she mistakenly boarded the wrong bus. She sat down in the only empty seat, and found herself next to Edward Andrew Bern. They married five years later in Mexico City.

Ed and Estela raised their three daughters in Sioux City, Ed's hometown. Estela worked as a nurse for 35 years at St. Vincent Hospital (later Marian Health Center) and taught Spanish to adults at Central High School in Sioux City. After retirement, she volunteered as an interpreter at the Siouxland Community Health Center. She became a naturalized U.S. citizen on March 4, 1988. Her advice for life was "make stars out of scars."

After Ed’s death in 1993, Estela moved to Kansas City and then to Iowa City, to be closer to daughters. In Iowa City, Estela enjoyed 10 years in her apartment at Ecumenical Towers, before moving in with her family. She was able to remain in the home with her family for her last six months of life because of the support provided by an extraordinarily dedicated, compassionate, and highly skilled healthcare team from Iowa City Hospice.

In addition to extended family in Mexico, she is survived by her daughters and their families, Estela Abramo, husband, Ken and son, Steven of Prairie Village, Kan., Mercedes Bern-Klug, husband Mike, and daughter, Cora of Iowa City, and Robin Scoblic, husband, Robert, and daughters, Isabel and Mia of Iowa City.

In addition to her parents, siblings, and husband, Estela was preceded in death by her infant grandson, Joseph Scoblic.

If inclined, feel free to consider a donation to Iowa City Hospice.