Joanne Roth

Joanne Roth

Washington

Joanne Roth, 86, of Washington, Iowa, passed away Saturday, August 12, 2023, at her home surrounded by her family. Washington Mennonite Church will host a visitation 4-7 PM on Friday, August 18 and a memorial service 10:30 AM on Saturday, August 19, 2023. The service will be available via Livestream at the Beatty Peterseim website, Facebook, and YouTube pages. Condolences may be mailed to: Roger Roth, 2800 Coppock Road, Washington, IA 52353. In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be sent to Crooked Creek Christian Camp, Washington, Iowa, or Hospice of Washington County. Beatty & Peterseim Funeral Home is assisting with arrangements.

Joanne Roth was born in Newton, Kansas, to Vernon and Lois (Kauffman) Roth on November 30, 1936, the oldest of eight children. In 1942, her family moved to southeastern Iowa to escape the dust bowl. Her father farmed south of Washington (now the site of Crooked Creek Christian Camp) and was an ordained Mennonite pastor. She attended Gray School, a single-room schoolhouse, later graduating from Hesston Academy and College in Kansas. Joanne took her Christian faith seriously, baptized as a young teen, and grew in her faith while attending Hesston Academy. Joanne married Roger Roth in 1960 and worked as a legal secretary at a Washington law firm until she had children, later returning to work during tax season when her children were in high school. She helped on the farm, canning, gardening, and occasionally driving tractor. She loved singing. She had a beautiful soprano voice and played the organ. She made it her mission to give her children the opportunity to study music. In her sixties, she re-started piano lessons and took up swimming lessons to overcome her lifelong fear of water.

Her travels with Roger took them to South Africa to visit their beloved exchange student, Cheryl (Joseph) Smith. They spent their winters in Sarasota, Florida, connecting with Roger’s cousins and brothers and establishing a second church home with the Sarasota Community Church. After retirement from the farm east of Wayland, Joanne helped design a new home on a bluff overlooking a timbered creek bottom that was part of her family’s farm. Her faith sustained her through the tragic untimely deaths of four of her siblings: Brenda (3 years-old, meningitis), Phil (21 years-old, car accident), and Jim and Stan Roth (54 and 50 year-sold, plane crash).

She had a good sense of humor, was an excellent cinnamon-roll maker, and loved creating a home. Even in her last year of life, when cognitive impairment challenged her identity as a competent homemaker, she continued to be hospitable and generous. She connected with a family from their church with young daughters who stayed in their basement for a year while their house was being rebuilt after a fire. The evening she passed away, the first day on Hospice in her home on Coppock Road, the girls came to say good-bye. One daughter shed tears as she stood by Joanne’s hospital bed, while the youngest remarked that Joanne dressed “fancy” with her matching outfits and jewelry. With a sense of peace and gratitude, we sang “Lift your glad voices” in the moments before she passed.