Phyllis L. K. Hoefling

Phyllis Lorraine Kimball Hoefling the youngest of five children in the L. A. and Harriet Goodenow Kimball family was born in 1926 near Battle Creek, Iowa. Before Phyllis started to school she had a special friend Barbara Fairchild who lived about a quarter mile from the Kimball farm home. Phyllis thought it would be great fun to go visit Barbara; so she did. When Mother Kimball found Phyllis the punishment meeted out was a long rope attached to the belt around Phyllis's waist with the other end tied to the clothes line. That was the only time Phyl ran away or any of the rest of the Kimball family for that matter.

Phyllis attended the first four school years at the Maple #5 country school. Then the Kimball family moved southeast of Battle Creek to a farm in the Grant #3 school district. When it came time for high school Phyllis joined her next older sister Miriam who had stayed during the school week with their Uncle Ray and Aunt Laura Goodenow in Battle Creek. We "worked" for our room and board. Their father took the girls in to Battle Creek on Monday mornings and picked them up on Friday afternoons. Sometimes a basketball game or other extra-curricular activity required a Friday night stay-over which ended with a Saturday morning ride with Uncle Ray as he went on his rural mail route which passed by the Kimball farm.

Phyllis earned her two-year teaching certificate at Iowa State Teachers' College (UNI). Her first elementary grade teaching position was at Graettinger Iowa followed by teaching elementary students in the Manilla and Denison schools both in Iowa. Phyllis and "Mac" Leonard Hoefling were married in 1950 in Odebolt, Iowa and took up farming on the Hoefling family farm on the outskirts of Odebolt.

Two children Patrick and Katherine were born to this couple. Pat and Ann and their family of nine children live on the Hoefling family farm now. Katherine (Kathy) earned her BSN after attending the area schools at Boone and Ankeny and then the University of Dubuque. She nursed in St. Luke's Hospital in Sioux City, Iowa and presently is an OB nurse at the Lutheran Hospital in Norfolk, NE. Kathy married Dennis Sateren of Wisner, NE in 1988.

They are the parents of two boys Joseph and Jabin. Dennis farms near Wisner and that's a plus for Kathy as she has and enjoys riding several horses. She has also enjoyed participating in several trail rides with her uncle Charles Colvin. For many years after her family left home Phyllis was a custodian at the public school. After she retired from that position she has become an expert doughnut and pizza maker at a local convenience store. Mac passed away in June 1989.

Phyllis especially enjoys her church with its opportunities to sing in the choir be a member of the PW (Presbyterian Women) and a member of the governing board at times. She now also has time to enjoy some social groups which working full time did not allow time for. Phyllis is happiest when she's helping someone - her grandchildren relatives and friends and working in her home and garden.

10/16/95