Karen Alice Schulz, an integral member of the Presbyterian Church in East Hampton for the 20 years that her husband, the Rev. Dr. Fredrick Wiley Schulz, was its pastor, died in her sleep on Feb. 6 in Blue Ridge, Ga. She was 89.
Mr. Schulz served as pastor of the church from 1973 to 1993, while Mrs. Schulz took part in the church’s handbell choir and women’s circle. Known as “selfless, compassionate, and empathetic,” she “lived to serve others and make the world a kind and just planet, sustained by her deep and abiding faith in Jesus Christ,” her family said.
She enjoyed the outdoors as a walker and bicyclist and frequented museums and art galleries, often sharing her adventures with her children and grandchildren, who remember observing bears with her in their backyard, visiting the Teddy Bear Museum upstate, and seeing dinosaur bones with her at the American Museum of Natural History.
Mrs. Schulz was born on a farm in Illinois on Sept. 8, 1935, to Kenneth Ray Loding and the former Katherine Alice Arnold. She and her brother grew up in California during the Great Depression and World War II. “She experienced tornadoes, earthquakes, and hurricanes,” her family said.
As a majorette in her high school marching band, she participated in the Rose Bowl parade. She graduated from Mark Keppel High School in Alhambra, Calif., and earned an associate’s degree in accounting and bookkeeping from a California community college.
She and Mr. Schulz were married on July 30, 1955. Early in their marriage they lived in California, as he led a parish in the San Fernando Valley for eight years. In East Hampton, Mrs. Schulz worked for 10 years as a personal assistant to the acrylic sculptor Norman Mercer.
After her husband’s retirement, they moved to Naples, Fla., and there she became a member and frequent volunteer at Vanderbilt Presbyterian Church. A lifelong supporter of civil and human rights, she volunteered as a tutor teaching migrant farm workers’ children to read in Immokalee, Fla. Three years ago they moved to Georgia to live with their daughter and son-in-law, Renada and Guy Martin.
Mrs. Schulz was known for her fine cooking and baking. She enjoyed westerns and watching football games with her son-in-law.
In addition to her daughter and son-in-law, she is survived by her husband, another daughter, Andrea Schulz of Fresno, Calif., and a son, Eric Schulz of Naples and his wife, Susan Schulz. She also leaves six grandchildren, Dustin, Kayla, and Dyllon Martin, Kristin Schulz, Amanda Kendrick, and Cassie Lannoy, and seven great-grandchildren. Her brother, Thomas Vernon Loding, died before her.
Her ashes were to be interred at the memorial garden of Vanderbilt Presbyterian Church.
Her family has suggested donations in her memory to Habitat for Humanity, online at habitat.org, the Heifer International Project at heifer.org, or the Southern Poverty Law Center at splcenter.org.
