Genevieve (Lavins) Lohmuller
Nora “Genevieve” Lavins Lohmuller died at Coventry Meadows in Fort Wayne on August 26, five days before her 96th birthday. Genevieve was a selfless, loving wife and mother to her ten children and their families.
Born to Bernard Sylvester and Nora Genevieve (Clancy) Lavins in Washington, D.C., on August 31, 1924, she graduated from the Academy of Holy Cross at the age of 16 and then attended Trinity College, Washington, D.C. She majored in biology and minored in chemistry.
While in college during World War II, she worked in the offices of the War Production Board and for the National Bureau of Standards. At the NBS, she helped develop proximity fuses and assembled transistors and electronic elements. After completing her bachelor’s degree, she worked for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as a bacteriologist testing the drug penicillin in clinical trials.
In 1950, she married Herbert Wendel Lohmuller, M.D. of Philadelphia and assisted in his private medical practice there. While Dr. Lohmuller served in the Army from 1954-56, they lived near Fort Hood, TX, and at the Arizona Navajo Ordinance Depot near Flagstaff, AZ, returning to Philadelphia, afterward. They moved to Bluffton, IN, in 1968 when Dr. Lohmuller joined the Caylor-Nickel Clinic.
In the Bluffton community, she devoted herself to service. She volunteered at the reception desk of the Caylor-Nickel Clinic and Hospital, and an avid reader, she was a member and president of the Foltz Literary Club. She began and directed a free childcare center to serve the Bluffton migrant farm families, so the children would not have to accompany their parents into the fields or be left unattended. Together with her husband Herb, she founded a free healthcare clinic for the migrant families as well. A member of St. Joseph Parish, Bluffton, she was active as a choir member and cantor, religious education teacher, and member of the parish council and migrant ministry. She was a Third Order Franciscan, member of the Diocesan Council of Catholic Women and the ecumenical group Church Women United.
She was immensely proud of her Irish heritage and enjoyed Irish music, history and literature. She never ceased to impress her children by her vast knowledge of varied subjects and keen abilities to sew, repair broken appliances, rewire lamps and fuses, and cross-pollinate her own plants.
Mrs. Lohmuller is survived by her ten children: Bernard (Karen), Martin (Jeannie), Mary (John Koors), John (Diane), Theresa (Larry Sell), Paul, Joseph (Ann), Margaret (James Pfister), Catherine (James Cicchiello) and Elizabeth (Ronald Grisoli). She’s also survived by 30 grandchildren and 41 great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her husband, her sister, Regina Marie (Lavins) Heisler, and her brother, Bernard Joseph Lavins.
Visit Genevieve Lavins Lohmuller’s Obituary at The GMC Family.com.