Delores B. Kenney

Delores B. Kenney left us peacefully on November 29, 2022, at age 89, just two weeks shy of her 90th birthday.

Delores was born on December 10, 1932, in Rib Lake, Wisconsin to William and Rose (Roiger) Tilch and attended Rib Lake High School. Following graduation, she moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin where she later met Eugene Kenney and married him on April 28, 1956. They adored each other to Gene’s last breath.

After living in Milwaukee and Colgate, Wisconsin for many years (followed by two years in North Carolina), Delores and Gene settled in West Bend, Wisconsin, where Delores lived for 48 years. She spent much of her career as an employment specialist at West Bend’s Job Service Center where she delighted in helping people match their skills to the right opportunities.

In retirement, Delores reveled in adventurous travel, including long road trips with Gene, girls’ trips with her sister Margie, and travel to Japan and the Philippines. She was also kind and giving. She dedicated many hours to volunteer activities that reflected her commitment to helping those in need and preserving natural spaces, including volunteer work at the Salvation Army of Washington County (not the least as a bell-ringer in frigid temperatures); Full Shelf Food Pantry; Interfaith Caregivers, where she provided transportation, house and yard work, and companionship; and the Lac Lawrann Conservancy, where she made many friends, giving her physical labor to preserve the land and raise money through the Conservancy’s annual flower sale; among other volunteer activities.

Delores was a talented gardener, reflected in her beautiful yard, bountiful with flowers, and her conservancy work. She was a ruthless Rummy 500 player, sometimes slyly using her diminutive stature to excuse her practice of holding her cards under the table. Delores had both an unforgettable laugh (referred to by some as “the silent scream”) and a wicked sense of humor that was with her to the end. She was also humble and would no doubt cringe at these words we write in her memory.

She is preceded in death by her parents, husband Gene, brothers Frances, Bernard, Irvin, and Melvin Tilch, sisters Lillian Klemm and MaryAnne Klemm, and son-in-law Larry Brown.

She is survived by her five children, Colleen Price (Roger), Laurel Kenney-Schellinger (Tim Schellinger), John Kenney, Karen Kenney-Lassiter (Wade Anderson Lassiter), and Jeannine Kenney (John Zim); four sisters Rosella Neddo, Marcella Hraby, Cecilia Szomi, and Margie Tilch; two brothers John and Harvey Tilch; eleven grandchildren Vicki Evans, Megan Brown, Brandon Price, Sarah Schellinger, Matthew Schellinger, Eli Schellinger, Sam Lassiter, Madeline Johnson, Luke Lassiter, Morgan Kenney, and Caitlyn Kenney; and six great grandchildren Haley and Hannah Evans, Clara McGrane, Eugene Schellinger, and twins Annie and Charlotte Lassiter.

Visitation will take place from 9:30 to 11:00 a.m. on December 10, 2022, at Holy Rosary Roman Catholic Church, 215 S. Washington Avenue, Medford, Wisconsin, followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at 11:00 a.m., interment of ashes at Medford Evergreen Cemetery, and luncheon at BS Bar on State Highway 64, three miles east of Medford.

In lieu of flowers, the family invites memorial donations in Delores’s name to the Friends of Lac Lawrann Conservancy in Barton, Wisconsin, or the Salvation Army of Washington County