Laurette was born Laurette Jean Williams on 21 December 1924 in St. Joseph, Missouri. Her father was a master electrician and WWI veteran, and her mother was the daughter of an immigrant muleskinner on the Chisolm Trail. Laurette grew up in the northern suburbs of Chicago, Illinois. An excellent student, after graduating from high school Laurette was in her first year of nursing school after the outbreak of World War II when she met a young sailor from Kansas, Merle Pribbenow, who was in training at the Navy Recruit Training Center outside of Chicago. The couple was married on 30 June 1944, and Laurette gave birth to her first child, a son, in Bremerton in the summer of 1945 while Merle was deployed overseas, stationed in the South Pacific. Merle made a career of the Navy and the family moved frequently, living in Bremerton, Seattle, Hawaii, Texas, Japan, Tennessee, and finally Whidbey Island, Washington, where Merle retired. The life of a military wife is a full-time job and Laurette devoted herself totally to raising her four sons and one daughter.
In 1963, after Merle retired from the Navy, the family moved back to Bremerton to be close to and help care for Laurette’s parents, who had lived there since 1945. In addition to caring for her family, Laurette also was active in the Lutheran church, raising her children in the faith and becoming a founding member of Peace Lutheran Church in Bremerton before joining the congregation of Christ the King Lutheran Church in Chico. Laurette loved camping in the Olympic Mountains and boating in Puget Sound, but she loved her family and her Lutheran faith most of all.
Laurette was preceded in death by her parents (Harry and Laura Williams), her husband of 65 years (Merle), her son Robert, and her sister Harriette,. She is survived by her sister Reta Stenion, her sons Merle (wife Thuy), Ronald (wife Nancy), and Timothy; her daughter Laurie Gonsalves (husband Gary), six grandchildren, four great-grandchildren, and one great-great grandchild.
Because of the Covid-19 situation, the family will hold a private burial service at the gravesite at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Bremerton on 1 July 2020. The funeral arrangements are being made by the Miller-Woodlawn Funeral Home, Bremerton.
SHARE OBITUARY
v.1.11.1