Graveside memorial services for Thomas and Avis Grundman will be held on Monday, August, 9, 2021 at 11 a.m.  at the Oak Hill Cemetery in Cherokee, Iowa. Pastor Larry Ostercamp will officiate. A luncheon will follow with details to be given at the graveside service.  The Boothby Funeral Home in Cherokee, Iowa is assisting the family with the arrangements. Online condolences can be left at www.boothbyfuneral.com

Avis Faye Clark Grundman, Loving Wife and Mother, Grandmother, Great-Grandmother, Master Educator, privately known lead foot and spectacular cook passed from this world surrounded by beloved family on December 2nd, 2020, at the very practical age -just like she was- of 82.

Avis was born in Dickinson County, Iowa, Spirit Lake Hospital, to Alton Dale Clark and Bernice Aletha Bellows Clark, August 24, 1938, making Avis a 4th generation Iowan who could trace her local roots back to pre-Iowa statehood and the founding Iowa pioneers. This is something of which she was proud, evidenced by giving each of her four daughters the middle name of Clark. Avis was also a Daughter of the American Revolution. She liked to tell the story of how she was kin of the brave Separatists who signed the Mayflower Compact (Edward Winslow), attended the first Thanksgiving, and formed an honest and lasting friendship with Chief Massasoit until his death.

Avis grew up on a farm outside Lake Park, Iowa and loved animals, especially kittens, and could watch a corn spider make a web forever, it being "like magic."

Even as a child, Avis was an exceptionally hard worker and practical person. Some of her chores when she was very young were: collecting the eggs from the coop, raising roosters for food, bringing in shelled corn cobs for heating the house and doing the mending. Later in life she became a master seamstress sewing many of her own and children's clothes. As she grew, she would also help care for her younger brothers Gary and Craig.

It might surprise some of you to know, Avis was never particularly squeamish. As a child she and her brother Gary would travel down to the creek and surrounding wetlands and play a game. The challenge was to see who could line up the largest number of leeches on their arms and legs before a parent would call them back from play. She said she often won. That said, she had a thorough distaste for mice and would recall seeing them run up the farmhand's pant legs as a child. She also thought it very disconcerting to stare into the dark cistern that creaked outside her childhood bedroom window at night.

Avis taught her girls to clip coupons at a young age as a result of being born during the Great Depression and experiencing her father Alton's subsequent conscription into WW2. She watched and toiled as the family sold everything they owned so her mother and siblings would be able to go live with their relatives for the duration of the war without being a burden on anyone. The abrupt end of the war happened days before her father was deployed, and they stayed in Lake Park and rebuilt their lives.  In reference to this time she would say "We ate a lot of rabbit and squirrel in those times- it's just what you did- would you rather have us starve?"

In high school, Avis played basketball for the Excelsior Eagles of Lake Park, IA, was in the marching band and earned the nickname of Flash. The first thing she ever learned to cook was a baked potato and she loved to eat and make fried chicken. She spent her childhood's warmer months at Okoboji and enjoyed fishing. As a young woman, she once caught a 3-foot carp off the bridge between East and West Lake Okoboji. So spectacular of a site it was to see this petite beautiful woman, in large sunglasses, red lips and a headscarf reeling in such a monster that cars stopped on the bridge to take pictures of her, causing somewhat of an extended summer traffic jam.

In 1956 Avis graduated from Excelsior High School in Lake Park and headed off to Iowa State Teachers College in Cedar Falls. Some of her fondest memories of her undergraduate study came from taking geology and other science classes at the University of Colorado Boulder. She also enjoyed the drive out west and the sparsity of the highway patrol in those days.

Cherokee, Iowa would never be the same after the autumn of 1958 when Miss Clark, in her driving gloves, sped into town to take her first education job as a 4th grade teacher at Lincoln School. Later that year, Avis's life took a sudden turn and we almost lost Avis in a horrific head-on car crash outside of Storm Lake,(*she was found not at fault). Avis spent several weeks at St Mary's Hospital in Rochester, MN and a Storm Lake, IA hospital where she had multiple surgeries on her face, knees and legs. Yet, no amount of scars could hide her beauty, and when Bachelor Tom Grundman came to her apartment by mistake, looking for another woman, and saw "Avie Baby" he knew he was done. Tom came back about 15 minutes later, said he still couldn't find the proper address or that other girl, and instead asked Avis out on a date, right then and there.

About 56 1/2 years ago Tom and Avis were married on July 25th, 1964, a true love story, and got to work on starting a family. They had 4 girls, Jane, Molly, Peggy and Abby within 6 years. Avis really put her education degree to quick work as she loved reading books to her children. At the supper table, proper grammar and manners were lovingly, but firmly reinforced. On top of raising her children, she also taught school at Roosevelt Elementary, Webster, and Wilson Jr. High School, with 4th grade being her favorite.

Avis liked fine things, pretty things, and was particular. Her cursive was flawless, her bedsheets were ironed. She was an accomplished pianist, played wonderful hymns, supported the Cherokee Symphony and made sure all her children took music lessons. She loved watching people paint pictures and insisted that her daughters sit utterly still for days on end as she had their portraits commissioned. She loved her dear couple friends and enjoyed many Martin's Access weekend picnics. Using her feminine wiles, and famous unyielding resolve, she convinced Tom to have an entire corn crib moved to the pony field, because the site of it ruined her view of the beautiful Mill Creek and Little Sioux River valleys from her picture window. Those river valleys, stark and wild, viewed from that family farmhouse window, are one of the last beautiful sites Avis saw of Iowa, passing 5 days later in hospital. So let's just say, she made good choices.

Avis had a way with roses and peonies and knew the benefits of a monstrous garden. In the summer and autumn Avis would chase her children out of the way of the pressure cooker, stuffed with tomatoes, onions, eggplant, peppers and corn, and everyone knew that if they didn't move fast enough, Avis might just can them up by mistake, in the flurry of it all. In her later years, Avis enjoyed teaching her grandchildren to cook freshly caught fish and made them refrigerator pickles, gooseberry/rhubarb/peach pies and cookies.

Avis was smart. At the age of 55 she returned to school and got her Masters in Reading from the University of Northern Iowa. More than the degree though, she liked the process of earning it. Avis devoured books and magazines faster than most are capable and in her retired years she'd recite smooth lines of poetry as she glided from place to place, filling her bird feeders, glancing at the outside thermometer, or religiously checking the rain gauge and documenting it on her meticulous calendar.

Avis was an active and respected pillar of Cherokee. She was a 50-plus year member of Chapter EE P.E.O. sisterhood and held numerous offices- including PEO President, secretary and chaplain. She enjoyed Tone Circle and being a 35-year member of International Alpha Delta Kappa Honorary Organization of Women Educators (Alpha Kappa Chapter) and Iowa Retired School Personnel Association. She showed her faith as a Memorial Presbyterian Church Elder, Sunday School Teacher and helped with Adult Education Courses.

Avis was an exceptionally devoted wife and faithfully sat by Tom's side every day for 4+ years in the nursing home, without fail, unless she could not make it into town in a blizzard. In the rare event she could not visit, she would always call him, and express her deepest, sweetest love. On Feb 14th, the anniversary of the day she was engaged, she would always wear a little Valentine on her shirt that said "I love Tom." In 2017 she was wounded irreparably by Tom's passing, and truthfully, we could all see that part of her died with Tom that day, too.

In the end, the best things about Avis never changed. She was wild on the inside and tame on the out. She gave soft hugs and tender kisses. Avis spoke from the heart and was honest and real. She was loved beyond measure and she bravely left this world with the same grace and dignity she held in life. There will never be another Avis, and it is painful to imagine the world without her, but she is joining good ranks as she was preceded in death by: her husband Thomas Burtness Grundman, parents Bernice and Alton Clark, brothers Gary and Craig Clark, parents-in-law Katherine and Ralph Grundman, sister-in-law and brother-in-law Jane and Howard "Axel" Grundman, sister-in-law and brother-in-law Susan and Ken Kramer, niece Elizabeth (Don) Mahon and numerous other loved ones.

She is survived by 4 daughters: Jane(John)Fischer of Cedar Rapids, IA, Molly Schallau and Gary Hayden of Sioux City, IA, Peggy(Chris)Lickiss of Newton, IA, Abby(Neal)Grundman-Guthrie of Arcata, CA, and Gary Schallau of Le Mars, IA, 8 grandchildren: Jack and Tom Fischer; Tyler, Katherine(Michael Emmons), Kyle and Brady Schallau;  Hazzard and Ender Guthrie; 2 Great-Grandchildren: James and Saphira Emmons, sister-in-law Georgia Clark(widow of Craig); nieces and nephews: Shannen (Greg) Hilsabeck, Tara Sargent, Lance (Carey) Clark, Jill (Russ) Peters, Sara (Mark) Reis, Ben (Jamie) Clark, John (Deb) Grundman, Tom (Patty) Grundman, Kathy Keywood, Martha Kramer Nudi, Thom Kramer and cousins Jeanette Kellar, Peggy Fiderio, other very special cousins, relatives and friends.

Visitation will be from 5 - 7 pm on Thursday, 12/10/2020, at Boothby Funeral Home in Cherokee, IA. The Family asks that everyone who attends please wear masks and physically distance.

Memorial Services and a Celebration of Life will be at 2 pm on Friday, 12/11/2020, at Memorial Presbyterian Church. The Family asks that everyone who attends wear masks and physically distance. The service will be live-streamed on the internet on the Boothby Funeral Home website with assistance from the Memorial Presbyterian Church. A recording can be borrowed for those unable to view live streaming or attend services.

As an expression of sympathy, memorial contributions may be sent in Avis Grundman's name to: The Sanford Museum & Planetarium Educational Fund, Cherokee Symphony Association, The Memorial Presbyterian Church, Cherokee Public Library or other memorial of your choice.

If you have a story to share, forms will be provided at the church, or you can bring a prewritten memory to either event or mail to family.