1929-2012
Our beloved Aunt Lillian passed away unexpectedly at home in Boise on Sunday, November 11, 2012, at the age of 83. She was the 2nd child born to Karl John Wirtanen and Ida (Ronbacki) Wirtanen, immigrants from Finland. She was born and raised in Bergland, Michigan and graduated from Ironwood High School.
She would often recount with fondness and humor her life growing up in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula with her parents on Lake Gogebic. Her parents were the first to develop property on the Lake which included boat and cottage rentals as well as a sauna. Since her father had many occupations ranging from owning his own logging company to tavern owner, she learned skills such as learning to drive a logging truck at age eleven and later helping her parents operate their family tavern in Wakefield. Some of the men that worked for her father and people who visited their tavern would have made great characters for a novel that would have depicted life from a bygone era in rural Midwest America.