Helene Therese (Hermes) Lamansky

Helene T. Lamansky, 76. a resident of Bettendorf, Iowa died on Friday, October 16, 2009 at the Clarissa Cook Hospice House in Bettendorf.
Her funeral service will be held at 1:00 P.M. Tuesday, October 20, 2009 at the McGinnis-Chambers Funeral Chapel in Bettendorf. Burial will be in Pine Hill Cemetery, Davenport. Visitation will be from 11:00 A.M. to 1:00 P.M. Tuesday at the funeral home.
Helene Therese Hermes was born May 24,1933 in Augsburg, Germany. She was the second daughter of Maria (Gumpert) and Jakob Hermes, a master piano builder. In spite of an education interrupted by the war, she completed the Abitur level of the German education system. She was active in ballet and field hockey as a youth. Her nickname then was “frog.”
Because of her knowledge of English, she found a job at the PX of the US Army base in Augsburg. It was there she met her husband, an American serviceman, Paul Lavern Lamansky. Paul and Helene especially enjoyed dancing. They were married at St. Ulrich’s Church in Augsburg on May 22, 1953. They honeymooned in Garmisch, Germany. She arrived in the United States in December of that year and became a U.S. citizen.
Helene’s first job in Davenport was as a waitress at Woolworth’s lunch counter, where her English skills again came in handy. She and her husband Paul, a carpenter, designed several houses which they then built, and Paul often quickly sold, so they lived in various areas of the Quad-Cities. She had resided for many years in Bettendorf.
Helene and Paul had two children, Gregory and Christina. Helene was a homemaker whose greatest joy was the raising of her children. When the children were older, she worked for several years at the Ben Franklin store in Bettendorf.
Helene had a love for music, especially of the Big Band era and German operetta. She was able to visit her family and friends in her homeland with some regularity and especially enjoyed the outdoor summer music theater in her hometown. The traditional late afternoon cake and coffee break was one of her favorite social activities.
Later in life, a chance meeting of a long-forgotten childhood friend from her ballet class in Augsburg brought her into a circle of German-born Quad-Citizens that greatly enriched her life. She counted them all as dear friends.
Her husband of almost forty years, Paul, as well as her parents and sister Annaliese Blow preceded Helene in death. She is survived by her son, Gregory Lamansky (Carol) of Wausau, Wisconsin and their two daughters, Kaitlyn and Laura, as well as her daughter, Christina Worton (Shawn) of Davenport, Iowa and grandchildren Jason Fairley and Ashley Worton Peterson and a great-granddaughter Emily Laine Fairley.
In lieu of flowers, the family asks for donations to be given in Helene’s memory to Clarissa C. Cook Hospice House, where she was so lovingly cared for in her final days.