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Mildred Keunen

Lead Summary

Mildred Keunen, 86, Hills, died Tuesday, March 8, 2016, at Tuff Memorial Home in Hills.
A funeral service will be at 1 p.m. Friday, March 18,  at the Steen Reformed Church in Steen. Burial of cremains will follow at East Side Cemetery near Steen. Visitation will be prior to the service.
Mildred Keunen was born July 21, 1929, to Ben and Johanna (Veldhorst) Keunen at the family home in rural Maurice, Iowa. The Keunen family moved to a farm near Steen in 1934. Mildred attended school in Steen through the eighth grade and received her high school diploma through a correspondence course with the American School in Chicago, Illinois. She then attended Rice Hospital’s nursing program for licensed practical nursing in Willmar, graduating in 1957.
She worked as an LPN in Valley Springs, South Dakota, and Sheldon, Iowa. In 1965 her father died suddenly, and she moved back to Steen to live with and help care for her mother. She workled at the Rock Rapids, Iowa, hospital for two years before continuing her nursing career at the Luverne Community Hospital, starting there on Aug. 16, 1965. She remained there until her retirement on Aug. 16, 1995.
Mildred was a lifelong member of the Reformed Church in America. She was baptized as an infant in Maurice, and she professed her faith at the Reformed Church in Steen. She taught four-year-olds in Sunday School for several years. She also read and studied the Bible daily.
She enjoyed playing piano and organ, singing old hyms, reading, doing crosswords, crocheting, visiting and going for breakfast with family and friends. She volunteered at Children’s Care in Sioux Falls with her sister, Bertha Bosch, for ten years. She played the piano for Dutch psalm-sings at Tuff, and “Music with Mil” hymn-sing was a Thursday event on the Tuff Home calendar for many years. She also played for hymn-sings at the Health Center in Rock Rapids, Iowa.
She is survived by her sister, Joy Aykens, Hills; nieces and nephews Beth Sakurai, Stan (Gloria) Bonnema, Ginger (Jim) France, Mark (Eva) Bonnema, Mike (Jodie) Bonnema; Paul (Carole) Aykens, Joyce Aykens; Roger (Carole) Bosch, Linda (Les) Hengeveld, Darrell (Marina) Bosch, Lois Bosch, Keith (Rondy) Bosch, Ladine (Scott) Marquardt, Lexia Bosch; and 28 great-nieces and nephews.
She was preceded in death by her parents; her sisters, Mickie and Bertha, and their husbands, Nelson Bonnema and Bill Bosch; her brother-in-law, Richard Aykens; a stillborn niece, Wenda Bosch; a nephew, Vergel Bosch; a nephew-by-marriage, Akira Sakurai; a niece-by-marriage, Kayce Bosch; a great-niece, Wendy Bosch; and a nephew, Don Bonnema.
Arrangements were by Jurrens Funeral Home of Rock Rapids, Iowa, www.jurrensfuneralhome.com.
 (0317 F)

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