Obituary of Katie Hawthorne

What to say in an obituary of a loved one? How does one sum up a life? Following convention, several blurbs of “born this day, preceded by so and so, survived by these folk” etc…it just does not seem right. Right? The life of Kay (Katie) Leone Dukes was anything but conventional…. So, buckle up, and let’s recount one of those wild rides thru the world few can compare to. 

Born in Maricopa county Arizona, on the 12 ^th of November 1957, Don Dukes and Dixielee Stice brought into the world a strong willed, precocious, classic old school tom boy.

Katie was game for anything. Her father reveled in the simpler, more laconic pace the wilds offered, and relished sharing these with his first-born daughter. From dry Arizona deserts to the woods and fields near Cedar Rapids, Iowa and all the way to homesteading a place in Montreal Missouri with her husband Kevin Hawthorne, Katie sure had seen and done some things. Early on, it might have been walking through the wilder parts of wherever she was, but later in life bloomed to things like the healing arts, growing food wherever she could, and raising a beautiful daughter of her own, (and no doubt quite a bit of cain along the way!)

Katie is best remembered by us for her amazing smile when she was happy, jumping up and dancing when a song tickled her soul just the right way, her devotion to her “candle”, Candice, her grand babies, Jasper Lee and Juniper Rose, and the fuzzy creatures that surrounded her.

Katie touched our lives in so many ways! Helping to raise her brother Don Dukes, her sister Kathy Lindsay, to graduating as a registered nurse, she was always here for those that needed help. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces, and folks that she just sort of “adopted”, all have been blessed to have known her. She enjoyed the quality times with those closest to her. The good days had her hanging with Molly and William Boyer, cooking and “coffee clutching” with Candee or Kevin in the mornings, and even tossing a few (or a lot) of drinks down with all of us on the back porch. She also was never more comfortable than curled up on the couch, a good book in her hands, the dog at her feet and the cat over her head. It has been a wild ride for us all, and life will not quite be the same without her. 

She was proceeded in death by her father, Don E. Dukes and her mother, Dixielee C. Stice.

She is survived by her loving husband Kevin B. Hawthorne; daughter and son in law; step daughter and son in law; her grandbabies; brother and sister in law; sister; nieces and nephews.

She will be sadly missed by all her family and friends.

Memorial visitation will be held from 2:00-3:00 pm, Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at Hedges-Scott Funeral Home in Camdenton, Missouri.