Kate Bluck, 77, passed away at home June 30, 2016, with her husband at her bedside, after a year-long battle with bone and lung cancer. She was a wife, mother, grandmother, aunt and friend for 57 years. Kate is now with her Lord and other family and friends in heaven.
She was born September 5, 1938 in Salt Lake City Utah, the daughter of Charles C. and Berta (Meyer) Rosier. She was raised in Salt Lake, graduated from Judge Memorial Catholic High School in 1956, and began work at Mountain Bell Telephone Company. In 1958 she met Willard (Bill) V. Bluck and they married in Salt Lake in 1959. Both loved the outdoors, camping, fishing and hunting. A son Greg, was born in 1960 and a daughter Traci, in 1963. In 1964, work required the family to move to Boulder City, Nevada, where they bought their first home and began learning about and enjoying the desert environment. While there, family and friends came to visit, see nearby Las Vegas, and enjoy nearby lakes to picnic, swim, and fish. After an eight month assignment to work in Long Beach California, where a son Keith was born in 1966, the family returned to Nevada until 1968, when work required moving to North Carolina and later to western New York. Needless to say, Kate was very busy with “mothering” the kids to adapt and thrive in these different locations in their early years. In 1971, work necessitated the family to relocate to Salt Lake. Living again in a larger city environment proved difficult. After looking at several smaller communities with a better school curriculum, the family moved just 35 miles west to Grantsville, Utah in 1973.
The move to Grantsville was needed to give the family some “permanence” where they could develop long term relationships with neighbors, friends, school mates and local community. In Grantsville, the family remodeled their house, built a garage and shop, grew fruit trees and vegetable gardens, raised rabbits, had horses and motorcycles, played tennis, golf, basketball and went camping, hunting and fishing. .The family was happy and life was good. In 1987, after all the children had graduated from high school and began leaving the nest, Kate and Bill moved to Denver, Colorado to start a new job assignment. They also began to travel more for pleasure when the job allowed. In late 1989, her husband accepted another engineering assignment in Helena, Montana, and they moved there shortly thereafter.
Living her last 27 years in Montana was wonderful. Kate began league bowling again as well as getting back to gardening, golfing, boating, fishing and hunting. She made many new friends. In 1993 Bill and Kate designed and built their final retirement home in the woods just north of town so she could “camp in the woods” every day. She enjoyed the wonderful views and the occasional visits of deer, elk, foxes, coyotes, and the many varieties of mountain birds. In 1995, Bill took an early retirement from his employer of 23 years and they started a family business doing engineering and environmental consulting, property development, and home construction. Kate assisted Bill in many different areas of the business. During this period, she encountered her first bout with breast cancer which she beat. She went on to have four additional bouts of cancer over the remaining 21 years of her life. The following three bouts of cancer only slowed her down a little bit. She conducted her normal duties and continued to bowl, golf, fish, boat, garden, travel and enjoy the other wonders of life until the last bout was diagnosed in 2015. Thus began a year of surgery, chemotherapy, and home hospice care which took a heavy toll on her, but she passed away peacefully. The family would like to thank St. Peters Hospital, Dr. Tom Weiner and his great staff, and St. Peters Hospice for their wonderful care and treatment of Kate. Cremation has taken place.
Kate was preceded in death by her parents and daughter, Traci. She is survived by her husband Bill, sons Greg and Keith, grandchildren Allison and Alexander, brother, Charles B. Rosier (Dinah), and nephews Charlie and Pat Rosier.
A memorial service will be held in Helena, MT at 2:00 PM on July 29, 2016 at Anderson Wilke Funeral Home, 3750 N. Montana. Please come and celebrate Kate’s life with her family. A reception will follow. Donations in lieu of flowers are requested to St. Peters Cancer Treatment Center or to donor’s choice. Cremains will be placed in the family plot in the Salt Lake City Cemetery at a later date. Please visit below to offer a condolence to the family or to share a memory of Kate.
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