Eleanore L Knecht

OBITUARY

Eleanore Knecht, 83, passed away suddenly from natural causes (non-COVID-19) on September 9, 2020.

She was born to the late George and Mildred Chadwick, August 20, 1937, in Barnegat, New Jersey. She graduated from Philadelphia Academy in 1954 and received a BS in Math from Walla Walla University in 1958.

She married Bernath (B.L.) Knecht in 1956. They lived in Walla Walla, Washington for four years prior to moving to Worthington, Ohio in 1960. Eleanore is survived by her husband, Bernath (B.L.); two children: Marlin Knecht, of Colorado; and Verna Bernoi and husband Michael, of Maryland. She is also survived by eight grandchildren: Jamie Bernoi Minney and husband, Gary, August Knecht, Anya Knecht, Matthew Bernoi, Mickey Bernoi, Elijah Knecht, Akele Knecht Reed and husband, Joshua, and Emmy Knecht.

Eleanore used her administrative and business skills, as well as her love for people in her various businesses. After teaching school for a few years, she sold Avon, then became an Avon District Sales Manager, was a Cambridge distributor, ran a Word Processing business called WordPlay, and did the accounting for the Worthington Seventh-day Adventist Church and the church school. She also managed rental properties for Harding Heritage Foundation as well as their personal rental properties. Eleanore enjoyed connecting with people. She was always ready with a smile and something positive to say.

Eleanore was active in the Worthington Seventh-day Adventist Church where she shared her talents as sabbath school teacher, hospitality leader, Pathfinder leader, church treasurer and through serving on the church board. She had great organizational skills and enjoyed connecting with people. She was a person with a servant’s heart, frequently helping others when she could, which she did through Meals on Wheels, and driving people to appointments. Eleanore and B.L. also served on mission trips to Santa Domingo and Venezuela. She became a member of Worthington Women’s Club (WWC) and served as Secretary, Vice-President and then President in 1990-91. She participated in the WWC special interest groups including Merry Munchers, Lunch Bunch, Book Club, Great Discussions and Arm-Chair Travelers.

Eleanore was an avid reader and frequented the library often. She enjoyed cooking and planning dinners for church groups and family gatherings. Another love was the outdoors and traveling. The family spent many weekends and family vacations camping, hiking, back-packing, white-water rafting and canoeing, including a five-day canoe trip in Algonquin Provincial Park in Canada. Their travels took them to all fifty states and many national parks. In addition to the fifty states, Eleanore and BL traveled to many continents and countries around the world, including: Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Africa, and South and Central America.

Eleanore loved her family and traveled to visit children and grandchildren when possible and arranged a few family vacations that included the multiple generations. She always had a ready smile and wanted to know how each person was doing. She will be remembered for her smiles, hugs, laughter, pies and cookies and all the love she shared.

The family will receive friends on Thursday, September 17, 2020, from 6 – 8 p.m. at the Worthington Seventh-day Adventist Church (fellowship hall), 385 East Dublin Granville Road. The memorial service will be held at Worthington Seventh-day Adventist Church on Friday, September 18, 2020 at 12:30 p.m. followed by the burial at Flint cemetery. For those unable to attend in person, the service may be viewed from the Seventh Day Adventist website. Please use this link https://video.ibm.com/channel/secondservice at the time of the service. After service times please use https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX8vH7YVggN3xJbSWCbqtzw/videos to watch a recorded video.

Donations may be given to the Worthington Seventh Day Adventist Church.

LIFE SKETCH OF ELEANORE L KNECHT

AUGUST 20, 1937 TO SEPTEMBER 9, 2020

Eleanore Leslie Knecht was born on August 20, 1937 in Barnegat, New Jersey. During her early years, she lived in Barnegat and then near Newark, New Jersey with her mother and grandmother, who she called “Grams.”

While Eleanore was in first grade, her mother attended an evangelistic series and decided to become a Seventh-day Adventist. Eleanore then started attending a two-room Seventh-day Adventist church school. She was very smart and was able to complete the 3rd & 4th grades in one year and then graduated from the 8th grade when she was just 12 years old. She went on to enroll in Union Springs Academy in Union Springs, New York for two years. While there, she became friends with Eleanor Myers (Ellie), who became a life-long friend. For her last two years of high school she attended Philadelphia Academy.

Then came the college years where she attended Washington Missionary College, aka “Washington Matrimonial College,” where she roomed with Ellie. Ellie worked in Health Services where Bernie Knecht was a frequent visitor. It was through Ellie that Bernie and Eleanore became acquainted. That acquaintance grew into friendship, courtship, and then a wedding on September 2, 1956 in Barnegat, New Jersey. In order to not be followed after their wedding, they created a mystery as to what they would use for a get-away car. Not seeing their car, friends guessed and decorated someone else’s car, while the newlyweds had Eleanore’s dad drive them to his boat on the Barnegat Bay which he used to take them to the next landing where their car was waiting. They had a successful get-away!

For Bernie to complete his mechanical engineering degree, the couple then moved clear across the country to attend Walla Walla College in Washington state. They loaded up a trailer built by Bernie, stopped in Worthington for a lovely wedding reception, and continued on their drive across the United States. The drive was not without a mechanical mishap or two, but fortunately Bernie already had great mechanical skills and was able to rescue them along the way.

While in Washington, Eleanore was able to complete college and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Mathematics, with an English minor. She worked as a 7th grade schoolteacher and then for an insurance company as Bernie completed his mechanical engineering degree. Life was soon to change for them as Marlin came along in September of 1959. Due to the timing of Marlin’s birth, Bernie was exempted from being drafted into the army. Bernie was able to graduate from Walla Walla in 1960, and then came the move back across country to Worthington, OH, where Bernie began his long career at Worthington Foods. Since his dad also worked there and had the same nickname of “Bernie” the two decided this could be confusing and both agreed to start going by their initials with the senior becoming BJ and the younger BL.

Just months after moving to Worthington, Verna was born. Now the young couple had two children less than a year apart! What fun having two in diapers.

In 1963 Eleanore became Church Treasurer and Evelyn Wiesner became the Assistant Treasurer. The two would count the money together and enter the data in the ledger books. It was during these weekly sessions that Eleanore, BL, and Evelyn discovered that they shared many interests such as hiking, camping, and canoeing. Evelyn soon joined the family in their weekend outings as well as some family vacations which ranged from Maine to California and Upper Michigan to Florida. Evelyn was considered part of the family and often joined the family for birthday and other celebrations and meals.

In the mid 60’s, Eleanore taught P. E. at the local church school and was a substitute teacher. One year she taught the 9th grade and taught math to multiple grades. In the later 60’s she did substitute teaching for the Worthington Public Schools. She also started selling Avon Products. She was highly successful at selling Avon and moved up to become a District Sales Manager for many years. She was a people person and readily made the connections with her customers and those she worked with. Verna well remembers when the orders would come in, she would help Eleanore bag up each of the orders and even went with her to deliver some of the orders.

For those of you that knew Eleanore well, you know she didn’t just have her hands in one thing at a time, she had her hands in many things at a time. She was able to run multiple businesses and be involved in volunteer work. She started using and then selling the Cambridge diet products, which BL joined her in as well. That provided them with enough start-up money that she was able to purchase several DecMate computers and start a word processing business. This was in the days prior to personal computers. Her business, WordPlay, served two purposes. She produced documents for businesses and individuals ranging from resumes, to investment portfolios, and maps for Red Roof Inns. The second purpose was to train others in the use of the DecMate computers. She would hold classes and trained others how to do word processing using the computers. One of the clients that sent their employees to her was Bordon Dairy. The business was successful, and she expanded from holding classes in their home to moving to the White House on High Street just south of Worthington, as well as hired others to help her. With time and technology changes the demand for professional word processing diminished. She then moved onto managing Harding Heritage Foundation rental properties for 12 years, along with managing several rental homes that she and BL had acquired. In addition to that she also did the accounting for the church school. On a side note - she and Verna took accounting together at OSU and were among the 1/3 of the class that stuck with it and successfully finished the course.

Eleanore was an avid reader and frequented the library often. She was often seen with a book in her hands. Eleanore loved being in the midst of things and had the gift of hospitality and a servant’s heart. She was very involved at her church and over the years was a sabbath school teacher and a Pathfinder leader. Going on campouts they got rained on so frequently, that they were referred to as the “Worthington Rainmaker Club.” She held various church offices and served as church treasurer. One of the things that she did, that I’m sure many of you have benefited from and remember her doing, is that she was the one who planned, organized and cooked for so many fellowship dinners, funeral services, and planned bridal and baby showers. She was a great cook and put those talents along with her organizational skills to use. She often made Russian teacakes for showers. Marlin and Verna loved those cookies and since Eleanore would limit what they could eat of the ones she prepared for showers, they soon learned how to make them, so they had their own to eat. One-year Eleanore and BL received the Volunteers Honor Award honoring them because of the many things that Eleanore did in the hospitality area and BL in maintaining the facilities.

Eleanore was also active in the community delivering Meals-On-Wheels. She was involved in the Worthington Women’s Club and served as Secretary, Vice-President and then President in 1990-91. She participated in the WWC special interest groups including Merry Munchers, Lunch Bunch, Book Club, Great Discussions and Arm-Chair Travelers.

Now back to those camping, canoeing, white-water rafting and backpacking adventures – many weekends were spent camping which often involved hiking and canoeing. It was on just such a trip, that Michael, Verna’s husband-to-be, would meet Eleanore and BL. Favorite spots of the family were the state parks in Hocking county such as Old Man’s Cave, Mohican State Park and white-water rafting on the Youghiogheny river in Ohio Pyle, PA. BL made a camping cupboard to facilitate Eleanore’s cooking process. Eleanore provided first class meals in some rather primitive circumstances, and in all kinds of weather including rain and snow! Eleanore was a fantastic pie maker which earned her the nickname that BL called her of “Pilly Piecrust”. Pies were a must for the camping trips as well as holidays, birthdays, and many other occasions. The family went on many and frequent camping trips. They didn’t look at the weather forecast, they just went and did what they could to have a good time. Mother’s Day was a very popular time to camp. The camping season started in the spring and sometimes encountered a late spring snow. It extended well into the fall and on occasion involved an early fall snow. Other friends also camped in the same area and provided many social opportunities that Eleanore enjoyed with her family.

There were a few very memorable back-packing adventures in WV. A couple that the family remarks on still are the time Verna came running out of an outhouse screaming with pants still down after seeing a snake stretched above the door. Eleanore never tired of laughing at this story. On another trip the family had crossed over a very small stream at the beginning of their trip only to discover a raging river on their return. “How are we going to get back across they wondered.…” Most were fun adventures, but there were a few frightening times as well. On a canoe trip on the Pine River in PA, the trip got quite dicey due to a large tree coming down in the river the night before. Multiple canoes capsized, people were stuck in the tree, and after rescuing others, Eleanore and BL were unable to find Verna and one canoe. After some time, she was located quite a distance down river where she had floated as she struggled to pull a canoe full of water to shore. She did not succeed, and the canoe ended up on rock further downstream - quite crinkled in the middle. Another memorable expedition was a five-day canoe trip in Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario, Canada. Memories from that involve thousands of mosquitoes, no-see-um bugs coming right through tent screens, Verna falling in a swamp while portaging and then having to rinse off in the very dark Ink Lake, forgotten food which had to be retrieved and then the family coming up short at the end. At the end of the trip it took meals at two restaurants back-to-back to satisfy the family! This was another of many family adventure stories that always brought a smile of remembrance to Eleanore’s face and her family’s faces too!

The Knecht family enjoyed traveling and took their kids to all 50 states, much of Canada, and some of Mexico. In later years, Eleanore and BL traveled to many countries on multiple continents. Their travels included Europe, Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Peru, and a couple of mission trips - including one in Santa Domingo to build a church and one in Venezuela. Favorite locations that were visited multiple times were the Canadian Rockies and Hawaii.

Eleanore is dear to all who knew her. She and BL raised Marlin and Verna to love the outdoors, taught them how to manage household chores, finances, and involved them with cooking for the family on a regular basis. On a side note, it was BL that taught Eleanore how to cook, but she soon took that to a whole new level becoming a fantastic cook and provided so many good meals for many. Eleanore was often the navigator on the many trips they took. She taught Marlin and Verna to read maps and let them take turns as well. Of course, that was long before GPSs and map programs on phones! She provided love and support to family and friends. She was an integral part of her Worthington church family. She loved her eight grandchildren, enjoyed celebrating their achievements, celebrating holidays, birthdays, and special occasions by creating special memories. And she enjoyed organizing multi-generational vacations and the joy of being with family.

She will be greatly missed.