Mabel Bertolatus

Mabel Mayer Bertolatus died on February 5, 2021. in Iowa City, Iowa. She had been living in Iowa City since she left her home in South Carolina in 2005.

Mabel was born at home on her family’s farm near Peak, South Carolina, on October 13, 1919. Her parents were G. Evans Mayer and Vennie Shealy Mayer. Like many Dutch Forkers of her generation, she was delivered by Dr. Carroll Pinner (grandfather of the current Dr. Pinner).

She attended the two-room schoolhouse in Peak and graduated from Pomaria High School in 1937. She then attended the Columbia Hospital School of Nursing, graduating in 1942. She practiced nursing and was an instructor of nursing at Columbia Hospital and Vanderbilt University Hospital. For a short while she worked in Philadelphia until she married John R. Bertolatus in 1948. She resumed her career in nursing some years later at St. Elizabeth Hospital in Elizabeth, New Jersey.

She and John spent the first 24 years of their married life in New Jersey, most of that time in Roselle. In 1972 she and John retired and moved to her parents’ farm in South Carolina. Four years after John’s death in 2001, she moved to Iowa City.

Except for her years in New Jersey, when she was an active member and a Sunday School teacher at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Linden, New Jersey, Mabel was a lifelong member of St. John’s Lutheran Church outside Pomaria, South Carolina, where the Mayers have been members since the church’s founding in 1754.

Mabel’s husband John, and her parents and brothers G. Albert and Roy E. Mayer, died earlier. She is survived by her sons John Andrew (Andy) (Dianne Atkins), of Iowa City and Roy Edward (Lynette Gaido), of Houston; also by grandsons Matthew (Jennifer) of Minneapolis and David (Jill) of Denver, and James Evans (Kathleen) and Teddy of Houston; great-granddaughters Avy and Lucy of Minneapolis and Laura of Houston; and great-grandson John Evans of Houston.

A graveside service will be held at St. John’s Church on Hope Station Road outside Pomaria at 11:00 am on Wednesday February 2021, with burial in the church cemetery. Due to Covid-19, masks and social distancing will be required for those attending the service.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial donations be made to the Disabled American Veterans, South Carolina, the Mayer Memorial Scholarship (Lexington County School District One, P.O. Box 1869, Lexington, South Carolina 29071), or any other charity of the giver’s choice.

The family would like to thank the staff of Melrose Meadows and Lantern Park Specialty Care, and Dr. Margo Schilling, for their care over Mabel’s years in Iowa City.