LouElla M. Lawrenz's Obituary
LouElla Margaret Lawrenz passed away peacefully Monday, January 13, 2014. She was ninety years old, having been born on July 5, 1923 in Blue Hill, Nebraska. She and her family, including six brothers and sisters, moved to Tacoma in 1930, eventually settling in Kapowsin. At a dance one night at Clear Lake, she met Norman Lawrenz, and thus began a long union. They were married on December 6, 1941, the day before the attack on Pearl Harbor, and lasted over 65 years until Norm’s death in 2007.
Norm and LouElla moved several times during the war before Norm was sent to Bari, Italy near the war’s end. Upon returning, they settled in a house on 7th and Tyler and raised two daughters, Lori and Marsha. LouElla worked a number of jobs through the years, including elevator operator at the Winthrop Hotel and at the Puget Sound Bank Building. She enjoyed the years she spent working in the cafeteria at the University of Puget Sound, conversing with the students, and ended her career in the same capacity at the News Tribune.
With Norm retired as well, they embarked upon a serious life of leisure, living in Kitsap County on Fairview Lake nine months out of each year, having family and grandchildren out regularly, then spending the winter months in Arizona near Lake Havasu City, reuniting with a group of old friends. LouElla loved to go to the sun each year!
She is survived by her sister, Carol Myers, daughters Lori Kennedy Dieckmann and Marsha Schiller, grand children Chris Kennedy, Devin Dill, Dawn Harris, Jaime Elseth, and Katie Hernandez, and great grandchildren Dayton Kennedy, John, Madalyn, and Brooklyn Harris, Jalen, Jordyn, and Jersey Elseth, and Mateo and Finley Hernandez.
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