Retired
Spouse: Terry
4 Children
7 Grandchildren
Information update: 04/22/2016

I grew up as the oldest child of a Finnish immigrant family who came to "America" by boat in 1949. My high school years were lived in a Finnish community in Duluth. I was designated as family interpreter and also coached my parents with their night citizenship class. At the end of my senior year, June 2, 1961, my brother and I became naturalized citizens of the United States along with our parents. There was no money for me to go to College so I began working for the Mutual of Omaha Insurance Company. The starting salary was $200 a month. I couldn't afford to leave home.

In 1964 I married Terry Smith who was a college student at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. He worked as a gas station attendant at that time and I transferred to the Minneapolis branch of the Mutual of Omaha Insurance Company to continue working in their typing pool.

In 1966 Terry changed jobs to become a Bloomington Police Officer and eventually became an undercover agent. The year after we were married we started our family of four children so I needed to become a stay-at-home Mom. From time to time I worked at part time secretarial jobs. Terry moved on to become part of the State of Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (MNBCA) working in their organized crime unit. In 1986 Terry was transferred from St. Paul to Bemidji as BCA Agent In Charge of the northern half of Minnesota. He and his agents worked a lot of homicides. I continued to work at part time jobs, which were more difficult to find in Bemidji. Later in life I went to Northern Technical College to get certified as a medical transcriptionist.

Now our kids are grown, we are retired and enjoy some traveling and our home on Lake Plantagenet.