Honor

We wish to pay tribute to our cousin Sarah and her role as the primary caregiver to her mother over the last years of her life. Sarah is one of five adult children of our father’s sister, “Aunt Floss” Frank. Sarah has been a teacher her whole adult life, and loves and shelters rescue dogs in St. Louis, Missouri. As kids we enjoyed playing with Sarah and her sisters Lydia and Mary and brothers Nat and Dana when they would come to visit us in New Jersey. After Aunt Floss’s husband Joe passed away, she moved from Amherst, MA to St. Louis in 1998 and had a condo within walking distance of the St Louis Art Museum, the Zoo, the Missouri Historical Society, where she enjoyed doing research. She spent summers on Beaver Island on Lake Michigan where she found peace and joy in the natural beauty of the island, the camaraderie of the native islanders and longtime summer visitors as well as providing a respite from the academic and political activities that she worked at in Massachusetts. She pursued her love of Beaver Island by volunteering many hours at the Beaver Island Historical Society where she edited volume 3 of The Journal of Beaver Island History. Floss and Joe loved sharing their Beaver Island home with any and all extended family who managed to find their way to the island. In fact, the last time we were all together with our Clark and Zartman cousins was on Beaver Island for Floss’s 80th birthday, a rare occasion as all nine cousins live spread out from the west to the east coast. In 2011, Floss moved into Laclede Groves where she lived in the assisted living, memory and nursing care units. Sarah, living nearby, acted as primary caregiver to her mom during those years. Growing up in a very musical family, Sarah told us that Aunt Floss was enjoying singing from My Fair Lady at the end. Our Aunt Floss passed away this year, 2021.