Maybelle (Moffatt) Hromatko

Maybelle Hromatko age 87 of Lake Wilson, MN died Saturday, January 8, 2011 at the Hospice House of Murray County in Slayton. Services will be 1:00 PM Wednesday, January 19, 2011 at the Chandler Funeral Chapel. Visitation will be held one hour prior to the service at the funeral Home on Wednesday the 19th. A luncheon will be served immediately following the service at the funeral home. Interment will be at a later date at Mt. Pisquah Cemetery in Hanska, MN. The Chandler Funeral Association is handling the arrangements.

Maybelle (Moffatt) Hromatko was born May 9, 1923, in Westfield, near Milnerville, Plymouth County, IA. to Vinton and Madge (Cline) Moffatt. After living on rented farms they moved to Minnesota at the time of the 1929 crash and bought land near Avoca, MN. She was educated in district schools and Slayton high school, now Murray County Central. She was a business student intern in Dr. Domes Office. She played piano for the Methodist Sunday School in Slayton where she had attended. She sang in Northrup auditorium at U of M with a choir. She started at St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN, majoring in music, but did not finish her freshman year, due to pneumonia.

She married A.J. Hromatko, in a Methodist Ceremony at her parents' farm in rural Avoca. They farmed until his death in 2007. During WWII she worked in the ration office in the Slayton, MN. She had one son, Wesley Vinton Hromatko, born October 2, 1947. Since sometime in the very early 1950's she was affiliated with the church of the Larger Fellowship Unitarian and then Unitarian Universalist. She read the mail sermons and compiled a scrap book of clippings regarding her religion. She acted as Sunday school teacher for her son Wesley. He remembers her reading to him and making him cowboy shirts. She made aprons from remnants that she sold in the Lake Wilson store and a second hand store in Slayton. As a young woman she helped with farm work including chickens that seemed to overflow the buildings and shocking. One memorable winter day she helped round up the cattle in a snowstorm. She drove a tractor on loads and helped unloading wagons. Later, she sold Avon and then worked as the bookkeeper at the Chandler Co-op where she learned to operate a computer. When her son Wesley, a UU minister, returned to Minnesota in 1990 to help and she and her husband continued to live on the family farm, she played the piano for services at small congregations that he served from time to time as a substitute until arthritis and Parkinson's Disease prevented her. She had played for school programs at District 72 years earlier. Maybelle kept going after a broken hip. When she needed a walker she enjoyed having it decorated for the season as she did for this Christmas. Her niece Cheryl, her nephew David's wife, started the decorating. She enjoyed books and articles about nature and pioneer days. She liked National Geographic and other science programs particularly about animals. Although in recent years she wasn't able to watch many. She wrote a memoir of A.J.'s many years on the farm that was used by Prof. Emeritus Joe Amato of SMSU in his research.

Maybelle is survived by her son Wesley and his wife Marilyn of Lake Wilson, MN; two sisters, Jane Spulak, Pueblo, Co. and Lois Kubicek, Lincoln, NE; one sister-in-law, Gladys (Eldon) Heetland; nieces, nephews and friends. She is preceded in death by her husband, A.J., her parents, and two brothers-in-law.

*The family requests that in lieu of flowers, memorials be given to the Nora UU Church, Hanska, MN. Unitarian Church in Willmar, All Souls Church, SD First Unitarian Church, Sioux City, IA, or Our House in Slayton, MN.