Adeline Sopa

Adeline Sopa, 83, a rural Amherst native and area Polish historian, died Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2017, at St. Anne’s Extended Healthcare in Winona, Minn.
Services will be held at 11 a.m. Monday, Feb. 6, at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church in Fancher, with the Rev. Father Daniel Hackel officiating. Burial will be in the parish cemetery.
Visitation will be at the church from 9 a.m. Monday until the services.
Memorials can be directed to the Michael J. Fox Foundation
for Parkinson’s disease research, Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church
cemetery maintenance fund, the Polish Cultural Institute of Winona Inc. or the
Polish Heritage Awareness Society in Stevens Point.
Shuda Funeral Homes & Crematory in Stevens Point and
Plover assisted with arrangements. Condolences may be offered online at www.shudafuneral.com.
Miss Sopa was born June 2, 1933, in rural Amherst, the
oldest daughter of the late Louis P. and Lillian H. (Konkol) Sopa. She later
moved with her family to a farm in rural Almond, where she grew up.
She attended Sunnyside School, a one-room school near her
home, graduating in 1947. She attended Almond High School graduating in 1951.
After working several years at Hardware Mutual Insurance
Company (now Sentry Insurance) in Stevens Point, she decided to pursue a bachelor’s
degree in teaching. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens
Point (UWSP) with study focused on biology, physical education and history. She
later earned a master’s degree from UW-Madison.
She taught physical education at schools in Berlin and
Muskego before moving to Green Bay in 1966 where she taught in the Green Bay
School District until her retirement in June of 1988.
She was active in the Wisconsin Education Association; the
Polish Museum of Winona, Minn.; and the Polish Heritage Awareness Society of Central
Wisconsin.
She was involved in genealogy research and the preservation
of Polish culture. After she retired, she did extensive research and writing
related to her family genealogy work, publishing two books on the Sopa and
Konkol families.
In 2008, when her health had declined due to Parkinson’s
disease, she moved to Fountain City to live with her sister. In 2011, she moved
to St. Anne’s Extended Healthcare in Winona, Minn.
Survivors include four sisters, Theresa V. McCamley, Joan
(Richard) Marchiando, Caroline (Ralph) Kostroski and Catherine (Kim) Rhutasel;
and eight nieces and nephews.
She was also preceded in death by one sister, Germaine; and one
brother-in-law, Peter.