Kim, Elise Booz (1876-1953)

Mennonite Weekly Review obituary: 1953 Apr 23 p. 6

Birth date: 1876 Mar 28

Mennonite Weekly Review obituary: 1953 May 7 p. 9

text of obituary:

MRS. EMIL KIM

Mrs. Emil Kim passed from this life to her eternal reward on Sunday, April 19, at midnight, at the Bethel Deaconness hospital, Newton, Kansas. Mrs. Kim came here from Switzerland in the spring of 1897. Her birthplace was in Moehlin, Switzerland, where she was born on March 28, 1876. Her maiden name was Elise Booz, daughter of Polykarpus and Xaveria Boeni Booz.

In September, 1897, she was united in marriage to Emil Kim, who too had come from Switzerland a year or two earlier. Mr. Kim was at the time a widower with three children. With her husband she was privileged to share the joys and sorrows of married life for 21 years. To this union were born six children, all of whom are living.

The place of their residence was well known to a large circle of friends and neighbors. In Harvey county, Kansas, about a mile east of where the O.K. school building stood, they lived on a small plot of ground, on a place that was always neat and attractive, and where flowers, vegetables, shrubs and trees grew in goodly proportions. Mr. Kim, whose art was that of interior decorating, was kept busy by the many requests for his labors. He died suddenly in 1918 due to heart failure. This left the mother with six small children. Her lot was not an easy one, but she had a strong faith in God, in whom she put her complete trust, and who never left her alone. She had also a great many friends who were very close to her, and to whom she was close. Her neighbors were her friends and their kindness she never overlooked. In the church too she was a Christian friend to all, both giving and receiving love and kindness. And when toward the close of her days she was confined to the hospital in Newton, she found the ministry of the Sisters, the nurses and doctors such that it spelled out what she would have liked to do for others. For all this the family is grateful. The class of nurses who had just begun their floor duties were noted with great appreciation by her, for they seemed to do their work with a wholeheartedness that she appreciated deeply.

Mrs. Kim, according to the practices of her church in Switzerland, was baptized as a child into the Lutheran church. When she reached the age where she could make her faith her own, she took Christ as her personal Saviour and Lord, and comfirmed [sic confirmed] for herself the vows which had been made for her earlier. After living in this country for a while, making their home near the Hoffnungsau church, she desired to become a member there. She was received into the membership of this church, where she continued a faithful member throughout the remainder of her days.

She raised her family under hardships and difficulties, but in the love and admonition of the Lord. To her children she was deeply devoted, and gave herself wholeheartedly as a mother to this her primary task. For the children she had a deep concern that each would become the child that God meant it to be, and that not one would be missing from the circle before the Throne of God.

It was a great satisfaction to her when last summer Rosa was privileged to visit Switzerland, the place of her birth, and the place where two of her step-children and other relatives are still living. After she had seen the pictures and received the greetings and heard the reports from her daughter, it seemed as though her journey of life had come to its completion, for only a few short months later she was called to her eternal home.

Besides the, three step-children, two of whom, John and Emil, are in Switzerland; and Anna of Great Bend, she leaves to mourn her departure her six children here: Rosa of the home; Katherine, Mrs. Peter Schroeder, and family of Buhler; Carl and family of Buhler; Bertha, Mrs. N. J. Thiessen, and son of Buhler; Arnold and family of Hesston; and Ben and family of Buhler. There are also ten grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.

Note: GRANDMA listing #264192 Booz, Elisa