June graduated from Eureka High School in 1949. She worked in a bakery and did housework, helping take care of her grandmother who had a stroke and helping mothers with new babies. She attended Goshen College in 1952 for one year and then graduated in 1954 from the School of Practical Nursing in Indianapolis, Indiana. She worked in Indianapolis at the James Whitcomb Hospital for Children for three years. In 1957 June served in Puerto Rico for two years in voluntary service under the Mennonite Church.
On March 31, 1961, June was united in marriage to Frank Eugene Buerge of Garden City, Missouri, at the Roanoke Mennonite Church in Roanoke, Illinois. They made their home on the farm in Garden City.
The home was blessed with three sons Kevin, Gregory, and Michael. She was a busy farm wife raising a big garden, canning, sewing, and quilting. June loved spending time with friends and family sharing a freezer of homemade ice cream. Her home was always open for grandchildren who needed a second home while mothers and fathers worked. June loved to travel with friends and tour groups. She traveled from coast to coast and two trips abroad visiting the Holy Land and a European tour.
June accepted Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior in her late teens and was baptized in the Roanoke Mennonite Church. She was active in the Harrisonville Mennonite Church as a Sunday school teacher, Bible school teacher, and was active for several years in the WMSC (women’s group). She served two years on the South Central Executive Committee as Vice President and President of the WMSC.
She was preceded in death by her parents, five brothers, Lewis Lee, Merrell, Eugene, Richard, and Daniel, a son Michael, and a granddaughter Michaela.
June is survived by her husband, Frank; two sons Kevin and wife Diane of Garden City, MO, Gregory and wife Amy of Garden City, MO; eight grandchildren Emily (Adam Shoulders), Michael, Christian (Abbie), Mattea, Randi (Jarrod Elliott), Jonathan (Brook), Jacob, and Jessi (Matthew Masek); six great-grandchildren Oakleigh, Oliver, Austin, Emerson, Ollie, and Zion; two sisters Geraldine Zoss of Roanoke, Illinois, Gladys Ulrich of Edmond, Oklahoma; one brother Raymond Zimmerman and wife Ruth of Eureka, Illinois; and many nieces and nephews and friends.
Cremation with a celebration of life service will be held at a later date. Inurnment at Clearfork Cemetery, Garden City, Missouri.
In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to St. Croix Hospice or Harrisonville Christian School and sent in care to Dickey Funeral Home, P.O. Box 432, Harrisonville, Missouri 64701.
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