Katarina Ptashnikov Glumac

Katarina Glumac of West Chester Katarina (nee Ptashnikov) Glumac died on March 7, 2013 of natural causes. She was 88 years old. She was the beloved wife of the late Prof. Dusan Glumac of West Chester University. She is survived by her children Dushanka Keane and Dr. Petar Glumac, her grandchildren Dr. Katarina Keane and Mary Schinski, and her great-grandchildren Emma and John Schinski. She is also survived by her sister Tatiana Galitizine of New York. A funeral service will be held at 4 p.m.on Sunday at St. Nicholas Serbian Orthodox Church, 506 Stahr Road, Elkins Park, PA 19027. She will be buried alongside her husband in the cemetery at the Holy Trinity Russian Orthodox Monastery located in Jordanville, NY at 2 p.m. on Monday. She was born in the former Yugoslavia to parents who fled the Bolshevik Revolution. Conscripted to work in a labor camp during the Second World War, she witnessed the firebombing of Dresden from inside the camp's fence perimeter. After the camp was liberated by the Allies, Katarina and the others walked the 1000 km back to Serbia. When her husband was imprisoned by Marshal Tito's communist regime in 1955, her then five year-old daughter was sent away to live with her maternal grandmother in the United States, leaving Katarina to fend for herself and her six month-old son. After her husband's release from political prison in 1962, the family moved to and was re-united in the United States. The family moved to West Chester in 1964 when her husband began teaching at West Chester State College. Katarina worked in the accounting departments at West Chester State College and the First National Bank of Chester County before taking early retirement to help raise her two grandchildren. As family and friends can well attest, Katarina was an accomplished baker, needlepointer and gardener. She had a life-long love for poetry.