By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
Anastasia Zawisza, 100, of 111 Cass Ave., died at 6:15 a.m. Wednesday, Jan. 3.
Arrangements are pending at Groner Funeral Home and Cremation Service.
She reached her 100th birthday April 10, 2006, thanks to a determination bordering on stubbornness
Saturday afternoon, April 15, her extended family filled Holy Maternity of Mary Catholic Church basement for Polish singing with accordion accompaniment, toasts and to watch her blow out candles on her sheet cake.
She has been blessed and blessed all of you, Father Leo Taubitz said.
Born in Poland, forced into Germany by World War II, emigrated to a North Carolina dairy farm, she came to Dowagiac in 1950, following Kuriatas and other friends.
Her husband went to work at Round Oak Stove. Cezary, who also kept beehives, was 69 when he died.
There were a lot of work opportunities in Dowagiac for immigrants, said Wally Kuriata, whose own family sharecropped in Louisiana after sailing to New Orleans instead of New York City.
"My brother and I and mom and dad picked cotton from morning to night for $90 a year." Drinking water had to be boiled to remove oil and rust.
"She's very independent and does pretty well herself," though caregivers assisted her, Kuriata said. "She doesn't like to ask for help. Her mind is sharp and she's set in her ways. She'll stop you and say, 'That's not the way I do it.' "
"She's unusual," agreed her oldest child, Wally, who attended from Chicago.
None of her children lived in Dowagiac, but Anastasia insisted on staying in her house on the corner near the golf course where her flowers won the admiration of Town and Country Garden Club.
She gave birth to 12 children, though some of them didn't survive childhood in Europe. She buried Adam, Leon and Kon.
Besides Wally, there were Dorothy in Belvidere, Ill., Sharon in Pennsylvania, Rose in Nashville, Joe in Florida and 18 grandchildren.
Sharon said when her family was in Germany her father had to dig bunkers in which the army put equipment.