Frances Jetty - Brookings

March 3, 1932 – March 18, 2018

Posted

Frances Laverdure Jetty, 86, died Sunday, March 18, 2018, in Brookings. 

Funeral services will be held at St. Ann’s Catholic Church in Belcourt, North Dakota at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, April 4 with burial to follow at St. Ann’s Catholic Cemetery in Belcourt.  There will be a liturgical wake service on Tuesday, April 3, at St. Ann’s Catholic Church at 7:30  p.m.

Eidsness Funeral Home is assisting the family with arrangements.

Visitation is from 5:30 until 7:30 p.m., today, at Eidsness Funeral Home in Brookings. 

Frances was born to Mary Bercier and Alfred Laverdure on March 3, 1932, on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation in Belcourt, North Dakota. 

After graduating from St. Ann’s School in Belcourt, she attended the Haskell Institute (now Haskell Indian Nations University) in Lawrence, Kansas, where she studied Commercial Vocations.

 Frances returned to North Dakota to work as a secretary at St. Michael’s Indian Mission, operated by the Benedictine Monks of Blue Cloud Abbey. On her first day of work, she dropped a file of mailing labels on the floor in the presence of mailing supervisor Alfred Jetty, who assisted with the file cleanup. 

Frances and Alfred were married at St. Ann’s Church in Belcourt on September 4, 1954.

 She and Alfred transferred to Stephan, where she worked as a secretary at the Stephan Indian Mission. The family later moved to Highmore, where Frances briefly co-owned a drive-in restaurant, worked as a cook, and finally operated a housekeeping service until her retirement. In 2001, Frances and Alfred moved to Chamberlain to be near their daughter, Anna Marie. 

 Frances joined the Highmore Court of the Catholic Daughters of the Americas in 1957 and remained a member of that chapter until her death. She also served a term on the St. Mary’s Parish Council in Highmore. In 1991, then Diocese of Sioux Falls Bishop Paul Dudley named Alfred and Frances as his Native American liaisons for the Diocese. 

They served together in this capacity for three bishops before retiring in 2011. 

 Frances assisted Alfred in his local and state leadership roles in the South Dakota Knights of Columbus throughout the 1980s and 1990s.  

She was humbled when she and Alfred were named as recipients of the Pro Ecclesia Et Pontifice Award of Merit by Pope John Paul II in 1997. She was also involved in the annual Tekakwitha Conference, organized by a group of Catholic Native Americans who asked the Vatican to recognize the good works of Kateri Tekakwitha. She served as a conference co-chair in 2003, when the Tekakwitha Conference returned to South Dakota for the first time in 24 years. 

Frances loved making new friends wherever she lived, and she cherished and maintained those friendships throughout her life. 

She was an excellent cook, known especially for sharing her chokecherry jelly, her frybread, and her Easter bunny cakes. 

Frances also enjoyed sports until health issues hindered her later in life. She was a member of two championship bowling teams in Highmore, and she scored a hole in one on two occasions at the Highmore Golf Course. She was an avid card player and enjoyed playing cribbage with family and friends.

She is survived by her husband Alfred “Bud” Jetty; son Ronald Jetty and wife Tammy Kempfert, son Michael Jetty and wife Laura Ferguson, foster sons Henry Bucholz and Bruce Bucholz, and four grandchildren.  

Frances was preceded in death her brother Raymond Laverdure in 2001, and  byher daughter Anna Marie Jetty in 2015.

To view a photograph memorial of Frances, visit her memorial page at www.eidsnessfuneralhome.com.