Mary Dykhouse

“Busia” is the Polish word for “grandmother”, and with her peaceful passing on September 21, 2022, Mary Sophia Dykhouse left a Busia-shaped hole in the hearts of family and friends around the world. Born at the Tomaszewski family homestead north of Gaylord, Michigan on March 22, 1928, she grew up on the farm assisting with the chores and attending a small schoolhouse, walking to school “through ten feet of snow in a blinding blizzard, uphill both ways.” After graduating from St. Mary’s School in Gaylord she worked for Western Union in Minneapolis and Chicago, where she danced to the likes of the Tommy Dorsey band in the immediate post-World War II era. She graduated as a Registered Nurse from Mercy College in Detroit and had a fulfilling career in hospitals and nursing homes in Lower Michigan, even taking loving care of several of her former Dominican Sister school teachers at Aquinata Hall in Grand Rapids. Upon retiring in 1993 she and her husband Gene moved to a cottage on their beloved Lake Superior at Whitefish Bay. Apart from regular visits to family and a trip to Rome, attending papal Masses with Pope John Paul II, she held forth at “The Last Resort” ever since, putting out the welcome mat to guests, watching lake freighters pass by, reading, drawing, cooking, sewing, writing extensively and presiding over a troop of tame chipmunks named after Greek and Roman philosophers and statesmen.

Busia leaves behind four children: Jenni (Wayne) Madden of Goulais River, Ontario, Marianne (Ed) Gay of Eaton Rapids, Michigan, Paul (Robin) Ignatowski of Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan and John Ignatowski of Escanaba, Michigan, and three step-children: Dennis Dykhouse of Hudsonville, Michigan, Debbie (Randy) Bailey of Houston, Texas and Richard (Julie) Dykhouse of Lowell, Michigan. She is also survived by twenty-one grandchildren and thirty-one great-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by her parents, Stanley and Sophia Tomaszewski, her siblings Raymond Tomaszewski, John Tomaszewski, Regina Krupiarz and Sylvester Tomaszewski, her husband Eugene Dykhouse, Flip, her daughter Deborah, son Jerome, grandson John Paul, granddaughter Amy and great-grandson Hank.

Visitation will be held on Monday, September 26 at 11:00 at St. Mary’s Church in Sault Ste. Marie, with Mass of Christian Burial at 12:00 noon. The graveside service will be held on Tuesday morning at St. Mary’s/Riverside Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations to the My Michigan Medical Center Sault Intensive Care Unit.