Iowa City Obituaries, April 2013

Lensing Funeral Home has been posting obituaries to the site for some time now, but I'm not sure if many people are aware of this. To make this more clear, and in order to share many of the touching obituaries I've read today and this month, I wanted to do a post that gathered all of them together.

Thank you to Lensing for continuing to upload onto the site, I will try to add more area funeral homes as I can to provide a free service to view and share obituaries for local families and funeral homes.

See Also: 

Iowa City Obituaries, January 2013

So here are the April obituaries as they appeared, in reverse chronological order.

Phil was a lifelong resident of Iowa City and worked at Ready Mix, Pest Control, and Kings Material before starting Phil’s Building Materials in 1984. He was a member of Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, University of Iowa Club Member, Hawkeye Alumni Association and many others.

Mary Ann Eakes, 58, passed away at her home in Coralville, Iowa on April 21, 2013. She was the daughter of Bernard and Lenore (Wagner) O'Conner of Iowa City and mother of two sons, Jacob and Matthew.

George worked as an Electrician with the Traffic Eng. department for the City of Iowa City for 30 years before retiring in 1994. He was a handyman and could fix almost anything. George enjoyed going to the cabin in Minnesota and going camping with his RVs.

Roger Mather died peacefully on Saturday at Mercy Hospice in Iowa City. A highly trained metallurgist, he wrote metallurgical articles, three books on playing the flute (a fourth to appear soon) and poetry for U.S. and U.K. anthologies.

Darrell was the Transportation and Maintenance Director for the Clear Creek-Amana School District for many years, retiring in 2001. From 1977 to 1999 he drove the school bus for both Clear Creek- Amana and Regina Schools.

Marguerite Knoedel, died April 23rd. She worked at the photo counter of Louis Drug Store, as a secretary for the Selective Service System during WWII, at Metcalf-Hamilton Construction, at the Red Cross, and at Burge Hall as a secretary.

Longtime Johnson County Treasurer Cletus R. Redlinger, 78, originally of Solon but a longtime Iowa City resident, died Sunday, April 21, 2013 at Mercy Hospital in Iowa City.

Edward Goetsch died April 20, 2013, at UIHC in Iowa City. He worked for Boeing, went to US Navy Midshipmen’s School at Notre Dame, and served in the US Naval Reserves for 20 years.

Olive Bright Wallace died peacefully April 18th at Mercy Hospital. Olive was employed for many years as a secretary in the UI College of Education and later as the chief certification officer in the UI Registrar’s Office.

Mary Gertrude Lahr of Iowa City died peacefully at Crestview Nursing and Rehab Center in West Branch. She will be remembered for her religious life and as a loving and devoted wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother.

John David Robertson, 55 died on April 12 at UIHC, of a pulmonary embolism. Robertson had a legal practice defending the rights of others. He also practiced Zen Buddhism, receiving the Dharma name “Taiyu”, Serene Way/Heart, upon being ordained.

Ruth Hale Skelley died April 10 at home following a short illness. Her 74 years of life contain an epic journey, and as such, each great story must come to its conclusion.

Donald R. Rochau died April 9. Don was active duty military for thirteen years. He served in Vietnam and was ranked 2nd Lt. Colonel. He continued serving in the Army Reserves where he attained the rank of Major.

Frederic C. Bedard, 91, of Iowa City passed away April 8 in Iowa City. A native of Ottawa, Canada, he served in the Royal Canadian Air Force and the Reserve Navy.

Ralph R. Roberts passed away March 28th at Mercy Hospice in Iowa City. An airforce veteran from WW2, Roberts dedicated his talents to building a strong Department of Rehabilitation and Counselor Education.

Dorothy Mae Larson of Iowa City passed away peacefully on Friday. She worked in the war effort during World War 2, and was passionate about raising rescue dogs.

Mike Noth of Iowa City died Tuesday in his home from pancreatic cancer. In 1973, he earned his master’s in computer science at the University of Iowa and later led large-scale technology projects at UI.