Caroline Sakalowskas, 98

Caroline (Vetter) Fraas Sakalowskas, 98, the matriarch of the Fraas-de la Motte family, died peacefully in her sleep on Sept. 27, 2003, in Mountain Home.

Funeral services will be held on Saturday, Oct. 4, at 11 a.m. at Faith Lutheran Church, 1190 N. 6th East St., in Mountain Home. Internment will follow at Mountain View Cemetery. Lunch will be served at the War Memorial Hall, 515 E. 2nd South St., by the American Legion Auxiliary.

Caroline was born on Aug. 30, 1905, on a farm near Crete, Neb., the eighth of ten children born to Josephine (Woiteshek) and Friedrich Vetter.

She worked as a housemaid in Lincoln, Neb., before her marriage to master carpenter Harold H. Fraas. They farmed near Denton, Neb., and moved to Mount Vernon, Wash., in 1937, raising two children through the Great Depression and World War II. They moved to Everett, Wash., and then back to Kearney and Lincoln, Neb.

After Harold died in 1959 Caroline helped her sister, Dorothy, run the Faculty Club at the University of Nebraska.

Caroline cooked for the football coaches and became a booster for the great Nebraska football teams. She retired to tend her garden in 1970 and moved to Mountain Home in 1976.

"Grandma found great happiness in her later years," her family said, marrying John Sakalowskas, a decorated disabled American veteran. He died in 1988.

She was a devout member of Faith Lutheran Church and belonged to the American Legion Auxiliary for 35 years. She was active at the Mountain Home Senior Center and "The Old Time Fiddlers" was her favorite dance music. "No one enjoyed a polka more than Caroline," her family said. "Friends and family will always remember Caroline for her fabulous home cooking and her lifelong habit of a daily dose of carrot juice. She was a self-taught musician, accomplished on the piano, organ and her beloved accordion."

Caroline was preceded in death by an infant son, two husbands, her son, Fred Fraas and his wife, Shirley, of San Diego, Calif.; her granddaughter, Julie Fraas Adriany of San Diego; and her granddaughter-in-law, Kathy Lee de la Motte of Lewiston, Idaho.

She is survived by: her daughter, Virginia (Ginger) de la Motte and her husband, Harold, of Mountain Home; six grandchildren, ten great-grandchildren and three great-great-grandchildren.

Memorials may be made to Faith Lutheran School, 1190 N. 6th East St., Mountain Home, Idaho 83647.