Donna Lee (Clark) (Sawle) Chesemore (formerly of Arena, Wis) passed away on May 23, 2024, at University of Wisconsin Hospitals with her children holding her hand. She put smiles on the faces of everyone around her for 88 years. And when her young children were pouting -she made them smile by telling them to try and stick their lower lip out even further. Cora (Stokstad) Clark & William Clark brought Donna into this world and to their little farm near Oregon, Wisconsin on August 9, 1935. She was the youngest of four girls and as she told the story, she was a little bit of an Oops Baby. Her oldest sister Catherine was 19 years older than her.

Donna's life was a lesson in resiliency.

When Donna was 7 her father suddenly died, and her mother went to work on the second shift at the Wisconsin School for Girls as a cook. Donna came home to an empty house after school, but the neighbors were always on watch.  She couldn't get away with anything. Her mother remarried when she was 16 and she now needed to adapt to a new stepfather, George Geary.

She worked at MG&E briefly after graduating from Oregon High School but one night she met a guy at Turner Hall who loved to dance as much as her. On June 16th, 1956, she married John Sawle and moved to the Mazomanie/Arena area to live on a dairy farm and raise six kids over the next 30 years - Nancy, Cyndy, Jon, Clark, Julie, and Kris.

She would milk cows, feed calves, do the laundry and still have a mouthwatering roast beef ready for dinner and cookies cooling on the table when kids arrived home from school-a feat that her children marvel at to this day. Her cooking and baking gave the family energy for the hard work of farm life but also it gave us mealtime traditions we continue to carry on. There would be sometimes 15 or 16 people around the table.  After 30 years the marriage ended. Over the next many years, she worked in Home Health Care where she cared for people. It was what she did best.

Then she met Jerry Chesemore. Jerry was the love her life. He raised sheep on a small farm near Platteville, Wisconsin and they became two peas in a pod. They sheared sheep, bottle fed little lambs and planted garlic. They married on March 10th, 2000. A few months later Jerry was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died on June 16th, 2001. She endured again.

"Uffdah! "Her brown hair and sparkling blue eyes were showstoppers but her smile and her warmth gave her an authenticity people gravitated to. She was loved and adored by her friends and family and oh-so proud of her Norwegian heritage. After her stroke in 2019 she still communicated with a smile, a kiss or by holding your hand.

The legacy that Donna leaves us can be found in what she loved - her children, her grandchildren, a good euchre game, a hard fried egg on toast for breakfast, a Louis L'Amour book, laughing at lunch with the Dover Babes, sitting on her beloved porch watching  ruby-throated hummingbirds fight for position at the feeder, bed sheets fresh off the clothes line, lemon meringue pie, seeing her church family at New Heights Lutheran Church, catching up with Becky Wornson, a bouquet of zinnias, a gift…any gift, beating her friend Joe at Sudoko, her entire High School class, her sisters, her nieces and nephews, her cousins… but what she really loved was having her entire family home for the holidays.

After several health challenges over the years, she would just say "Oh Shoot!" and move on.  She never dwelled on the negative and if she needed a pick me up - she would plop herself down at the old upright piano (and in later years the organ) and play a polka while her two youngest daughters danced through the house.

She survived by her six children; Nancy (Barry) Sawle-Knobloch, Cyndy (Jim) Gove, Jon (Jennifer) Sawle, Clark (Jackie) Sawle, Julie Sawle, and Kris Sawle.  She is also survived by 14 grandchildren scattered across the country:  Christian, Madison, Alec, Chris (Linde), Katie (Adam), Sam, Jaime (Jackson), Heather (Jon), Blair, Kelsey, Nick (Katie), Koren, Ryan, and Megan and four great-grandchildren:  Alex, Clark, Hazel and Jasper

Donna was preceded in death by her parents, Cora Geary, William Clark; her stepfather, George Geary and her three sisters; Catherine Pasell, Caryl Spellman, and Phyllis Sperle.  She was also preceded in death by her former husband, John Sawle (January 2019) and her husband Jerry Chesemore (June 2001).

Donna's favorite show was Larry's Diner on RFD TV where she would watch and listen to Country Western music from groups like The Oak Ridge Boys who once iconically performed "Life's Railway to Heaven". The song is about the trials and tragedies that everyone faces…

"Blessed Savior, thou will guide us.

Till we reach that blissful shore

Where the Angels wait to join us

In God's Praise evermore."

The family would like to thank Donna's Doctor Janelle Hupp, the Staff at Ingleside Nursing Home in Mt. Horeb, the University of Wisconsin Hospital Staff and the New Heights Lutheran Sunday School for sending monthly hand-drawn pictures.  She loved those pictures.

Memorials in Donna's honor should go directly to New Heights Lutheran Church, 314 Anne St. Mazomanie, WI  53560.

Donna Chesemore will be laid to rest in Platteville next to Jerry Chesemore in a private ceremony on June 22nd in Platteville, Wisconsin. The family would like to invite all of you to a celebration of her life at Grandma Mary's (175 US-14, Arena, WI) from 2:00 pm-5:00 pm on June 22, 2024.

Her children will miss hearing "GOD BLESS AMERICA!!!!" (when we were in trouble!)