Sharon Leigh Kunke

Sharon was born October 20, 1951, in Fort Worth, TX. Except for a high school year in Omaha, NE, (very cold) she spent her first 22 years in Fort Worth. After graduating from O.D. Wyatt High School, she took classes at Tarrant County Junior College. A friend asked her to help paint the cast room at a local dinner theater; it was there she met another volunteer who would woo and win her. She and Lawrence James (Jim) Kunke were married September 15, 1973, in Fort Worth. Sharon and Jim had two children together, a daughter born in Fort Worth and a son born in Webster, TX.

During the early part of their marriage the family moved several times for Jim’s career. Sharon kept busy raising the kids and working as a sales associate/assistant manager at a jewelry kiosk in Victoria, TX, volunteering in her daughter’s middle school library in Baton Rouge, LA, and returning to retail sales at a clothing store in the Clear Lake City, TX, area. After returning to Clear Lake in 1992, they bought a house and stayed put for the next 31 years.

Sharon was an avid fan of the band Chicago. She was a member of the Chicago True Advocates and attended concerts literally coast (West Palm Beach, FL) to coast (Saratoga, CA) and places in between. She also loved her furbabies. She and Jim always had cats around and usually had a dog or two as well.

Sharon was preceded in death by her mother, Bessie Deloris Carey Crayne, and her father, Murl Cecil Crayne; by her in-laws Jim D. and Jacqueline C. Kunke; and by her stepbrother-in-law, Richard Berg.

She is survived by her brother, Stephen Crayne, and half-sister, Suzan Crayne Davis; by her husband, Jim; by her children Jennifer Lynne Kunke, Jason Everett Kunke and partner Malisa Humphrey, and stepson L. James Kunke, his wife Laurie Michelle, and their daughter, Macy Elizabeth; by her stepsiblings-in-law, Paul and Linda Rider, Cathy Berg, Steve and Cheryl Rider, and their combined eight children and eight grandchildren; and by her adopted family Marshall and Mary McShan and children Bailee and Kade.

Thank you to the medical team at HCA Healthcare Clear Lake and especially to ICU nurses Shellie and Shannon. Your professionalism, compassion, and dedication are appreciated. She was never “just a patient” to you.

There will be a remembrance service at Forest Park East Funeral Home on Monday, February 12th at 10:00 am; visitation will be at 9:00 am. Sharon then returns to Fort Worth for interment at Laurel Land Cemetery on Friday, February 16th at 11:00 am.