Kathryn (Kay) F. Lang

The family has requested, in lieu of flowers, please, donate to Kathryn's favorite charities (please, click title for appropriate link):

The Danny Thomas St. Jude Children's Hospital ; and, The National MS Society.
 

TO BE LOVED……………………TO BE REMEMBERED

Kathryn (Kay) F. Lang was born in Portland Oregon on February 16, 1937 to Clifford Emerson and Mary Agnes Hardwick.   She was born at Emanuel Hospital during a vicious winter storm. The storm was blowing down the Columbia Gorge, and her mother wanted to beat it, arriving by train and lived at the Heathman hotel until Kay’s birth.  On the day of her birth, the delivery doctor skied to the hospital in order to deliver her. She and her older sister, Mary Jo, lived in Hood River from 1937-1945, where their father had his General Medical Practice.   There she started her education, completing the 1st thru 3rd grade.   She began violin lessons at the early age of 8 years old.  Just after the War (1946) the family moved to Philadelphia for a year while her father sought specialized training as a Colon & Rectal Surgeon.  They returned to Portland where he established his practice, and she attended St. Mary’s school, at the Catholic Cathedral in downtown Portland, for 5th grade only.  The following year, she transferred to the newly established Catholic Parish and elementary school at St. Thomas More, in the Portland Heights.

Upon graduation she attended St Mary’s Academy, with the Sisters of the Holy Name and graduated in 1955.  During her high school years, she continued her love of music with the violin, continuing with instructions from Boris Sirpo, a world renown violin instructor.   She became a member of the Portland Little Chamber Orchestra which was founded in 1953. Sixteen talented young women musicians made up the orchestra, representing a cross-section of American life. During their first European tour in the summer of 1955 the group impressed audience after audience with their “impeccable style, technical precision and tonal brilliance,” and more often than not were asked, “Please come back soon.”  Organized as a goodwill tour, the orchestra performed 27 concerts in 13 countries. These included Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, England and France, including command performances before the President of Finland, the King and Queen of Sweden and the Queen of Denmark.

Upon graduation from St Mary’s (1955), she explored entering the medical field, as her talents and interest were with the sciences.  This interest was expressed to a family friend, who encouraged her to attend USC in Los Angeles, where she spent her freshman year. She was unhappy there and returned to Portland to continue her education as a sophomore at Portland University.  Even with this vigorous curriculum, she continued her interest in music and prepared for another trip to Europe with the Portland Little Chamber Orchestra under the sponsorship of the USO the summer of 1957. After completing her junior year, she transferred to the University Of Oregon Medical School to complete her medical training as a Medical Technologist, graduating in 1959.   Registered and certified, she had gained the ability and technical knowledge to cross match bloods in the early stages for open heart surgery, a skill making her in great demand by all hospitals wherever she lived.

She met her husband, Jon, a junior, at the University of Portland, during her sophomore year and the courtship continued until August 7, 1959, when they were married at St. Thomas More parish, after her graduation.  They lived in Portland and Eugene, Oregon as well as various Air Forces Bases while Jon was in the Air Force. During that time, she worked at various hospitals (including Providence, Portland, Eugene, Oregon; Gritman, in Moscow, Idaho, while Jon was attending Law School) before moving to California in 1965, where Jon had accepted a senior management position with Van Camp Seafood’s.   Here they raised their four children, and she retired with 32 years at St. Mary’s hospital in Long Beach.

Kay was extremely active (1967 thru 1981) with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Jrs. (Long Beach Division), holding a board position.  She contributed her talents and many hours to raise financial funding to support many musical programs. Her deep passion was traveling in the Philharmonic musical van to schools within southern California explaining and showing different music instruments, in order to help inspire and develop a musical interest in youth.

She caught the last train out thru Heavenly Pass and arrived at the large and mystic beautiful Heavenly Train Depot, April 20, 2018.   She was 81 years old. Her parents preceded her. Kay is survived by her husband of 59 years, Jon; daughters, Patricia Anne Marie (Hayes) of  Henniker, NH, Susan Diane (Raggett), Garden Grove, CA; sons, Stephen Francis, Los Alamitos, CA, James Clifford of Prosper, TX; and her sister, Mary Jo (Bolton) of  Los Alamitos, CA. She had 9 grandchildren, and 1 great grandchild.

                                                                                                                                       Jml, 2018                                                                                                                                   

 “ A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it

                             back to you when you have forgotten the Words”

LOVE

I love you,

Not only for what you are,

But for what I am

When I am with you.

I love you,

Not only for what

You have made of yourself,

But for what

You have made of me.

I love you

For the part of me

That you brought out;

I love you

For putting your hand

Into my heaped up heart

And passing over

And the foolish weak things

That you can’t help

Dimly seeing there,

And for drawing out

Into the light

All the beautiful belongings

That no one else had looked

Quite far enough to find.

I love you because you

Have helped me to make

Of the lumber of my life

Not a Tavern

But a temple;

Out of the works

Of my every day,

Not a reproach

But a song.

I love you

Because you have done

More than any creed

Could have done

To make me good,

And more than any fate

Could have done

To make me happy.

You have done it

Without a touch,

Without a word,

Without a sign.

You have done it

By being yourself.

Perhaps that is what

Being in love means, after all……

                        J.M.L., Circa 1962-63

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