Peggy in Duluth

Margaret Helen Foss Dollinger

Welcome to this website dedicated to memories of Peggy 7/27/2020

Pure Duluth

Peggy's early Days

Peggy was born on the 4th of July in 1944 in Duluth, MN, to parents Helen Agnethe (nee Vedo) and Gunnard Adolf Foss. Sister Lynda Ann Foss was two at the time. Brother Jack would come along one year later. Helen and Gunnard were first generation Norwegians whose parents had settled in Duluth after immigrating from various parts of Norwary (Trondheim, Eidsvoll, Avaldsness, and Drammen areas). .

Gunnard worked for Bell Telephone as a lineman and Helen maintained a lovely home on College Street (next to UMD) and close to Chester Bowl. The kids grew up playing outdoors, skiing and tobogganing in Chester Bowl park as it was practically their back yard. They attended Chester Park Elementary, Woodland Junior HIgh and East High School. The family worshiped at Chester Park Methodist Church and all the kids were confirmed there. Helen was very active in the church... so the kids were also!

Helen and Gunnard bought a small cabin on Grand Lake (30 miles from Duluth) just two miles from where Gunnard had grown up on a dairy farm. The family would spend weekends swimming, canoeing, fishing, picnicking and romping in the woods at their little "hytte" (Norwegian for cabin). And it was little - just a one room cabin that Gunnard built! Gunnard and Helen would eventually build a retirement home on the property and lived there for nearly 30 years.

Gunnard had only his father (Nels) and Norwegian bachelor farmer brother (John) and they lived on the dairy farm. His mother, Randy Haraseth Foss, passed away in the 1950s and Brother Daniel Foss died in a car accident (failed brakes) in Duluth at age 23 Helen had five brothers and sisters (Gudryn, Iver, Nels, Marge, Ben) in the area so there were family gatherings on the Vedo side with aunts, uncles and cousins. Peggy was named after Helen's sister Margaret who was known as "Auntie Marge"..

Peggy excelled at writing about personal experiences and enjoyed all outside activities in school. She loved animals and had a few dogs as pets... and was forever bringing home stray cats. Peggy loved to play with the farm cats at Uncle John's farm. .

Comments of a lifelong Friend

My Friend Peggy

“ Friendships are born in a million different ways.” Peg and I met in 9th grade. We shared the stage!.. . as candidates for 9thgrade day queen. She was fun and funny and grand.. tall with gorgeous wavy blond hair and regal in her high heeled shoes which we all got from Baker’s shoe store on Superior Street.

Actually, we shared several “stages” together at different stages of our lives. One of them… “the slopes!” Many of our high school friends in Duluth skied. I did not. Peggy decided I should. I had no ski equipment or clothes. I rented skis and she loaned me her green jacket and off we went to Mont du Lac with Jack and the cool “older girls,” sister Lynda and Susie Johnson. Revelation: She was born to ski. I was not. Graceful and confident, she came down the hill like a beautiful silk ribbon. I had orders to follow, which I did in a terrified “snowplow” which was to forever characterize my skiing style. It “tightened” a bit, though never really quite” paralleled”… so to speak. But it was great fun and a warm up for a future spring break trip to Aspen with brother Jack and our exchange student Annelies Van Elk. The drive was memorable. Independent and on our own… Whoopee! …listening to the radio full blast in the middle of the night crossing Nehraska - Petula Clark and

“ Downtown.” It was my driving shift which I thought merited regular doses of malted milk balls to help keep me awake. I guess searching for them in the bag made a noise? I thought Peg was sleeping until I heard, “ Stop!@ eating that candy!” She was very careful of her teeth and nicely worried about mine.

In the summer of 10th grade we took a Speedwriting class. Our mothers decided it would be good for us to take the course at the Duluth Business School in case we wanted to be secretaries? Not! We wanted to be English majors.. and were! Essentially, the class taught us how to write words without vowels… that was about it. To write a paragraph that way you cut down on about a nanosecond of time. I remember it required an oversized book I threw right in the trash, but the bus ride to the West End together was fun.

We did not ever work as secretaries, but we did work at the Pancake House.She was a waitress, wisely, as she made more money, and I was a hostess. Her talent as a waitress was obvious..chatty and fun and always paying a lot of attention to the children… the way to a parent’s heart.. and gratuity… she said!

Our manager had a boat… a big one.. which we went out on one stellar Lake Superior night. We did some fabulous stargazing and consequently did miss the Superior entry coming in, quite fast, but oh well, it worked out!

At UMD we did share a cultural curiosity. His name was Erik Lindeck Pozza. Another exchange student …,,.from Austria. But in the end we were more interested in Austria, i.e in things Tyrolean, about going to “the Continent,” which we did, separately and also together. We wanted to see the world! .. and were sure it wanted to see us. Plus which, we could speak French, as much as you could after French II and the ALM conversation method. We were eager to try it out, sure it would be a hit…both impressive and useful.

I ended up going to Paris to summer school at the Sorbonne to “improve” my French!.. which served to help my parents approve the viability of the trip. Peg planned her own. After the summer session I got a job in a little family owned hotel in(unfortunately,) German speaking Interlaken, Switzerland. Peg came to visit and check it out in the fall. She did not stay in Interlaken. It was getting cold. I had no warm clothes or money to buy them. She gave me her wonderful big brown fuzzy coat.” I’ll get another one, she said.”

“ Take it”.. and she was off to another( also unfortunately) German speaking territory, Austria, to babysit on a military base and have access to the PX. Smart! We kept in touch. She invited me to go on a trip to Morocco with a girl she had met. I was up for adventure but not quite that much. She bravely went and had a great time.

In mid December my mother came. Peg joined up with us and we traveled together eventually making it to Berlin. It was gripping.. the time of “The Wall,” which was outlined with pieces of broken glass and marked by flowers on the ground where those who had jumped had died.. but there was a light note. The name of our hotel was Das Hotel Rempter which she laughingly and dramatically pronounced RRRRRRRRRempter! much to our delight but not to that of the frowning, serious Herr hotel clerk!

In the middle of our lives, she disappeared for awhile and took up with a man named Rex.. whom she described to me one night (as we were hanging out in the College street kitchen) as looking like Gregory Peck. At the time she was pacing, waiting for a call which she said would determine her future. He called ,and it did. They married and she went back to live in Peoria, to grow Christmas trees, have Matt and get a Master’s degree and teach and then, go off to Geneva where she did get to speak French and write and edit a guide book. She out Europed me!…And then.. amazingly we reconnected back in the mountains in Montana where she and Rex bought a condo right across the parking lot from ours. We could yodel across it as we were wont to do, or call out “EeeYaKee” as Timmy did to Lassie when he rode his bike down the driveway. Our kitchen windows were across from each other. Great happy times together. Skiing ( not the same runs) and sharing dinners ( Peg always brought the best salads) celebrating Rex’s 70 th birthday, walking Keeper down Curly Bear road, long talks and the fun of being together.. again.

When her world began to change, she stood her ground, still grand with her crown of wavy hair, and still skiing like the wind. Our last mountain lunch together was at the restaurant at the top where we walked to the edge of the mountain, looked down at the valley and surrounding peaks which looked a lot like Switzerland and Austria, and held hands in the sun. Our last “conversation” was on the couch in Bayfield, in her architectural masterpiece, her beautiful Scandinavian red house with carved wooden “Lutsen” pillars..and ingeniously inside a little Swiss, a little Norwegian, a lot grand and lace curtain cozy..with a reading room and a studio for yet another talent… painting.

If you can know a person by their books this is what you would know about Peg just from just one half of a shelf in Big Sky. A love of and passion for everything! “Imagining Home,” “History of Lutsen,” “The Sky, The Stars, and the Wilderness,” “ The Travels of Jamie McPheeters” “Walking With the Wild Wind,” “ A Short History of Nearly Everything,” “Easy Recipes,” and “ The Thinker’s Way.” She was a force field of physical and intellectual energy and talents and interests. She loved to read and learn, but almost most of all, she loved to walk, to be outside. So many walks together.in Big Sky, and always the # 1 favorite in Bayfield, the Brownstone trail. She helped manage and maintain it. It was ( and is) Peggy’s Trail!”

A lasting memory is paging through an art book of famous Impressionist paintings, she pointing to the details of each one, especially the Cezannes, noting the shapes and shades of colors - her talent appreciating the depth of his. We talked, now, in a special language, not French, not German and not really English… but a language that somehow we both knew, and had always shared.

Our last time together we didn’t… talk…. just sat in the sun listening to the wind chimes …holding hands and watching the waning afternoon light play with the leaves on a nearby tree.

I could feel the heartbeat of her hand, in mine.

I loved being her friend.

Ann Lewis, St Paul.MN

Photo Gallery

Peg's dream home on Lake Superior in the first winter of occupancy 2005. It was a joy to build and although not perfect we had a marvelous time with our contractors and followed the directions of our marvelous friend and architect Kurt Beckman. More pictures are included in the Bayfield section.

The replica columns and ogies mentioned by Ann in her comments hand crafted by the Dollingers before installation.

Winter view of the house from the lakefront. A wonderfully comfortable place to live and live well.

Another lifelong friend

Bonnie Simenson

Peg and I became friends in the 9th grade when a new junior high school was started and everyone was making new friendships. Our friendship remained throughout our lives, even though we were both often living in many different places.

Peg was so much fun to be around, always ready to do something. We both had a love for the lakes and fishing and every summer we would head up to their cabin, put the boat in the water, drop in our fishing lines and float all over the lake. We never caught a fish but our suntans were the best ever. During the fall and winter it was traveling up the shore and mostly skiing at Lutsen. If you are from Duluth, loving Lake Superior is part of our DNA.

My favorite memory of Peg is their wedding. I flew into Duluth and my mother met us at the airport with an arm full of blankets as it was -28 F. Sister Lynda and I were Peg’s attendants and we wore hunter green velvet dresses. Peggy was the most beautiful bride ever, wearing the most sophisticated dress. She was a gorgeous bride. Despite the wonderful Duluth Weather it was a fun, fun wedding.

Our lives scattered from there on, but we still kept in touch. Peggy and Rex are God parents to our daughter Katie, and every year we would connect and catch up.

Peg always had a strong personality with an energy to match. She always had dreams of Europe and of Lake Superior. With Rex’s support she was able to achieve many of them. She was talented and able to enjoy it all. She lived life to the fullest

She is missed by many friends, but we are all left with the best of memories…