Catherine (Woodward) Kurtz (1915 - 2005)

Born 27 Feb 1915 in Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania

Died 13 Apr 2005 at age 90 in Manheim, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania

Biography

"Catherine Woodard Kurtz passed through the gates of this earthly life in the early morning hours of Wednesday, April 13, 2005. She was 90 years old and lived at Pleasantview Retirement Community, on Rainbow Terrace for five years prior to her death. Born on February 27, 1915, she was the daughter of the late James Walter Woodard and Mary Brogan Woodard. She had a brother James Woodard of Pulaski, Virginia who died previously. She was born in Pittsburgh and raised in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and Tennessee, the daughter of a sawmill/master bricklayer and a nurse midwife. She often told her family many colorful stories of her upbringing in the South in a family of Irish Catholic heritage. She had a wonderful sense of humor laced with many southern and Irish antidotes. Her gentle wisdom was admired, respected and sought by those who knew her well. She taught in a one room school in southern Virginia after she graduated from high school. She attended Philadelphia General Hospital School of Nursing, part of the nursing school of the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing and received her RN degree in 1938. She spoke fondly and proudly of her days in training at old Blockley and instilled in her family a need to care for those less fortunate among us. While in nurses training, through the brother of a girlfriend from Adamstown, she met her husband, the late Clyde Kreider Kurtz. After her husband finished his military service in the U. S. Navy, she lived with her family in Denver at the A. G. Kurtz stone quarry until she became a widow after Clyde's sudden death in 1954. She then moved to Ephrata for her remaining years where she raised her three children, while doing occasional private duty nursing. Her compassion and skills as a nurse were widely admired. She is survived by a daughter, Susan Kurtz Mecholsky, wife of John J. Mecholsky, Jr. of Gainesville, Florida; a son, James Woodard Kurtz, of Wayne and a daughter, Claudia Kurtz Kirk, wife of Timothy W. Kirk, of Paradise. Another daughter, Sarah Ann, was stillborn in 1954. She has eight grandchildren and three great grandchildren. Sadly, this wise and gentle person passed from this earth but her beauty and spirit live on in her children and her children's children. She will be warmly remembered and keenly missed by all her family and longtime friends. She was Roman Catholic, a parishioner of Our Mother of Perpetual Help Catholic Church in Ephrata. Friends and family may pay their respects at a closed casket vigil at the Stradling Funeral Home, 201 Church Ave., Ephrata, on Friday evening from 6 to 8 PM and at the church on Saturday from 1 to 2 PM. A Mass of Christian Burial will be held on Saturday, April 16th at 2 PM at Our Mother of Perpetual Help Catholic Church, corner of Pine and Church Streets in Ephrata. Her remains will rest at the Shirk Reformed Mennonite Cemetery near Brownstown in West Earl Township. Memorials gifts may be sent to Pleasantview Retirement Community Benevolent Fund, 544 North Penryn Road, Manheim, PA 17545." Lancaster Newspapers Inc, Intelligencer Journal (Lancaster, PA) April 15, 2005 P.B3 & B4

(From Find-A-Grave)

Sources

• http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=63810019