Sharon could stand on my hand while I lifted her nearly to the ceiling before she could stand alone and she enjoyed doing it. We took her with us on a shopping trip in St. Louis some time before Christmas in 1954 and when she would grow tired of being carried we would find a corner of the store that was quiet and do this to give her a rest from the routine of riding my arm. A couple of the clerks in one store thought we must be from a circus or something.
Kim Garrison, Donna Taylor, Sharon, Joan Tuggle
Kim Greening, another member of the gang.
Now Kim Saalborn
College girl and her grandmother, podding peas or snapping beans?
Graduated, Missouri University, Columbia, 1975
Sharon graduated with a major in marketing in three years after testing out of the first year's requirements and graduated with honors. She did so on an academic scholarship also, thereby saving Mom and Dad some bucks.
Mr. & Mrs. Peter J. Markovich, August 16, 1975
Wrapping packages for Christmas at Grandma's house.
In-laws descend on newly weds for Pete's graduation from UMKC
Sharon's department in Penny's store in West Kansas City
Game of Rumikub in Kansas City
After graduation from UMKC, Pete taught high school general science for a couple of years in Kansas City. Then he got on with IBM and worked in K. C. for a spell, later transferred to Washington, D. C. and they lived in Manasas, VA. Sharon continued with JC Penny, working in a store in Maryland. After a couple of years there, IBM transferred Pete to Atlanta, GA and Penny's obliged by giving Sharon a job there also. In 1989 they made the decision to adopt and went to Peru. They spent nine weeks, plus there and adopted Moises at 4 1/2 years and Manuel at 2 1/2 years. Following the adoption, Sharon quit her job with Penny's and became a "stay-at-home Mom".
Picture taken in hotel room in Lima, Peru.
They got possession of the boys very shortly after arriving there
but were required to remain in Peru waiting on a very slow paper
shuffling process of adoption.
Following the adoption of Moises and Manuel, Sharon quit working altogether and devoted herself to becoming a full-time, stay-at-home Mom which, in later years became a soccer, baseball, hockey, swimming, football and Boy Scout Mom. She and Pete also made certain that the boys were well grounded in Christianity by becoming involved in many of the youth functions of the church.
During the year of 1992 she and Pete became involved with a mission effort designed to care for children from other countries while they were in this country for medical reasons. I think it was known as "Heal the Children" but I'm not certain and the name is of little consequence. The effort involved being parents to children, taking them to and from the doctor, the hospital and often sitting by their bedside while they were in the recovery process. We have pictures of three of the six they were involved with. Reuben, the first was with them for nearly eight months while awaiting an operation to correct damage done to his hand when he fell into a fire. Julio was here for heart surgery as was Fatuma. Fatuma was from Ethiopia while the others were from Central America. Ingrid, the youngest, was here to correct an open spine. None of these children could speak a word of English. One thing that amazed me about every one of them was their lack of fear of their surroundings. Most were quiet and seemed to accept their circumstances as somewhat normal. Reuben was the exception. He was very vocal and very active but unafraid. He loved to roughhouse with the boys.
Sharon with Reuben at an airshow.
Reuben
Fatuma, here from Ethiopia for heart surgery.
Julio, being tutored by Manuel in the art of video games.
Julio was also here for heart sugery, from Costa Rica, I think.
During October of 1994, Pete and Sharon went to China to adopt another child. They went to an area of China just north of Vietnam where they adopted Lian. It was only about a two week trip rather than like the nine weeks they spent in Peru for the boys. Lian was just over two years old when they adopted her.
Picture taken in China at the orphanage.
Picture taken at the airport immediately after getting off the plane.
She didn't waste any time getting acquainted with the boys.
"The Family", December 1996
Working with children at Asbury Methodist Church
She was an avid card player.
Oops. This picture should have been placed a few years earlier.
Easter, 2003
Manuel’s Tribute to Mom
I will never forget the feeling that was inside of me Tuesday evening at about a quarter past seven. After my six o’clock doctor’s appointment I went to the drug store to get my prescription. I noticed that I had a Missed Call on my cell phone from home. I just assumed that it was mom calling to see I was going to swing by the house and pick up some of my mail that still goes there. When I pulled up to the house I saw the State Trooper car in the driveway. I knew something wasn’t right, so I walked into the house. I saw Lian crying and ran up to the kitchen. Dad was sitting there and so was a State Trooper. Dad told me that Mom died today. The only thing I could say was that I wanted Mom to come home, I didn’t want anything else but that.
In the year of 1988 I met a wonderful person named Sharon Lee Schwanke. I mostly referred to this person as Mom.
One of my earliest memories of Mom was when Moises, Mom, and I were sitting on a sidewalk in Lima, Peru and she had bought a bottle of Coke to share. It was the first time I had ever drank from a glass bottle. I immediately put my mouth around the bottle and proceeded to drink, leaving drool and slobber all over the bottle. From then on, every time we would sit on the sidewalk to drink Coke, she would bring a separate cup for me to drink from.
There were several good times, from finally convincing that she and I should eat lunch down in the basement in our house in Bettendorf, or watch me play outside. The time Moises and I would climb into Dad’s pants and slide down the stairs in Woodstock, Georgia. How she used to sing me to sleep at night. Mom enjoyed spending time with us, from coloring books to board games. She wanted us to travel and each year we went somewhere fun, like the Black Hills and Mt. Rushmore or Ruby Falls in Tennessee.
Mom was very patient with Pete, Moises, Lian, and I when we would act immature. When I was little I would un-tie my shoes and then throw them. For a long time I would just scream and carry on like a child, considering I was two. After a short while I would bring the shoes with the string laces back to Mom and have her lace them back up. And Mom would tie them up, without question, and with questioned tone that I would understand at that age ask me why I was acting silly. Mom also would let me wear what ever I wanted to wear any day of the week when I was little. Even if it meant wearing a Ninja Turtle costume in April through J. C. Penny’s. Or the time it took her several tries to get the bowl to sit on top of a Stanley Cup replica cake for my birthday.
I remember having a bad dream about waking up and mom not being there. She heard me crying in my room, tended to me. I told her that I missed my mom in Peru and didn’t want her to leave. She gave me a hug and started to cry. She said that I again was being silly and had nothing to worry about. She said that, "She was never going to leave me, and that I was worrying over nothing, and that Dad isn’t going to leave you either.". Anytime that I was sad, she was there to comfort me.
Mom had a talent for making some of the best Halloween costumes on the planet. It seem that every year I would come up with something harder than the year before. From Moises and Me becoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to the both of us becoming Wolverine and Gambit from the X-Men. From Speedy Gonzalez to Dark Wing Duck. Mom was just great at sewing, which she learned from her mother Lois or Nanny as she is better known as. Because she was so good at sewing I would always get her to make stuff for me and my action figures. Almost every time Nanny would come visit, Mom and her would go to fabric stores, whether in Bettendorf or Iowa City or Woodstock, Georgia. I would see the two of them hanging out where ever their sewing machines where.
Mom was the least selfish person I have ever met. She would sacrifice career moves that would gain her more money to spend time with her family. She always put Pete or Dad’s job as the foremost priority. She would never hesitate to take Lian, or Moises, or I to the doctor’s if either one of us was sick. She always worried about Moises and Me, not because we were little and afraid of shots and needles, but because we were her boys. She didn’t want to see us get hurt. She was right there when Moises needed surgery on his knee, when Lian needed surgery on her leg, and when I had my back injury. She put our health and safety before hers. Mom also worked with Healing The Children program which would ask volunteers to take care of less fortunate children from other countries and get them medical treatment. Most of the conditions required plastic or reconstructive surgery. Throughout her life she took care of children that weren’t hers. Right up to the last time I saw her on Sunday evening. I was sneezing and my eyes were puffy and she told me that I needed to make an appointment with the doctor. Before I left the house that night she gave me an insurance card and wrote on a piece of paper the phone number of the doctor’s office.
It was hard to find very many pictures and videos that had Mom in them, mainly because she was the one taking them. I never noticed it before till I was going through the photo albums, that with every picture we were seeing the world the way she saw it. The several pictures of her family and all of it’s members reinforce the fact that she loved every single one of us.
The last picture of Sharon that I am aware of, taken at the reception following Ryan and Lindsey's wedding in St. Louis, Pete, Sharon, Moises with Manuel in the background.
July 8, 2006
The following tribute was written by Manuel and he read it at her funeral service.
It is presented here just as he wrote it on the night before the services.
