Departing Clark Lake can be bittersweet.  Bitter, when the departure is final; sweet, because of the remembrance of a loved one shared among those still here. 

On Monday, July 4th, at 5 pm, friends and family of Katie Rensch will gather on the water in the Eagle Point Cove.  The location would be Katie’s view if she were looking out on the Cove from the deck of her home.  It would be an incredibly familiar view.  It would be the view Katie witnessed during her 95 years at Clark Lake.  It’s only fitting this would be the location to honor her memory. 

Katie passed away peacefully in her Clark Lake home on March 7. Nephew Ted Ligibel tells the story of how Clark Lake became home.  “The daughter of the late Fleurange (Cunningham) and Aloys Rensch, Katie was born on September 13, 1926 in Toledo, and grew up in the cottage built by her grandparents, Ben and Frances Rensch. The Rensch’s had been vacationing at Clark Lake since 1898, coming by train from Toledo, and then steamer across the lake to the Eagle Point Hotel dock. In 1907, they decided to erect a cottage in the Eagle Point cove…one of the very earliest on the lake.  As an annual summer resident since 1926, Katie just might have been the oldest living Clark Lake resident.”

Ted explains summers-only ended in 1992.  That’s when Katie and her late sister, Mary, converted the cottage to their permanent home and they became full-time residents of the lake. 

It’s not unusual for a remembrance to be held on the lake.  One occurred along the Eagle Point shoreline for Katie’s sister, Angela Ligibel in 2016.  Another occurred in the Cove in 2015 when friends and family gathered to remember Kay Vermeulen Nichols. 

Katie’s family welcomes friends to join them to remember her on the lake, in the Cove, on Monday at 5 pm. 

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