It is with profound sadness that we announce the loss of our mother, Rowetta (Johnson) Freese on Saturday January 6, 2024. To honor Rowetta’s life a private family service is being held. There will be no public services.  The Haudenshield Funeral Home and Cremation Services in Cuba City Wisconsin is serving the family.

Rowetta was the third (arriving minutes after her twin sister Rowena) of eleven children born to Leroy and Elizabeth Johnson on September 7, 1926 in Henrietta Oklahoma.  A woman of grace and dignity she grew up during the Great Depression.  As a young girl she worked along side her father picking cotton, hoeing corn and any other task that was asked of them, to earn money for their family. Most of the houses they lived in had no indoor plumbing or electricity. During this time they had no money to buy coal to heat their home.  When the coal train came through their town, they would go down to the tracks and pick up coal that had fallen off the coal cars and used this to heat their home.  In a era where most left school after the 8^th grade, she was no different.  When Pearl Harbor was attacked on December 7, 1941 the course of her life changed. In 1944 she went to work in the Officer’s PX store at Camp Gruber in Muskogee Oklahoma. After the war, at the age of twenty-two, she completed high school and attended one year of college. During summer break she joined her twin sister Rowena in Dubuque Iowa, to earn money for her next year of school. Once in Iowa, she was hired to work in the slice bacon department at the Dubuque Packing Company, where she worked for eleven years. It was during this time that she met Joseph Freese from Hazel Green Wisconsin. They fell in love and were married on May 3, 1954 at Saint Patrick’s Catholic Church in Dubuque.  From their love came two children, Stephen Freese and Mary (Richard) Brimeyer, and four grandchildren, Marie and Andrew Freese, and Holly and Jacob Brimeyer.  They shared 42 years together before he died in 1996.

Rowetta was loved and cherished by many people.  Those left behind to honor her memory are her son Stephen Freese and his children Marie and Andrew, her daughter Mary (Richard) Brimeyer and their children Holly and Jacob, her sister Margie (Larry) Gilliland, and her brother-in-law Richard Reed, along with many nieces and nephews.

Those who opened their arms to welcome her into heaven were her beloved husband Joseph, her parents Leroy and Elizabeth (Crawford) Johnson, her twin sister Rowena (Joseph) Boyer, sisters Betty (Carace) Radney, Norma (Richard) Dill, Ester (Thad) Nunn, Priscilla (Jack) Smith, Rose Ann (Bob) Green, and Carolyn Reed, her brothers Gene (Carol) Johnson and Arthur (Mary) Johnson.

Rowetta’s family would like to extend a most heartfelt thank you to nurses and staff at Luther Manor and Hospice of Dubuque.  Your kindness and compassion will never be forgotten.

In lieu of plants & flowers, a Rowetta Freese Memorial Fund has been established. Online condolences may be left for the family at www.haudenshieldfuneralhome.com