Carline Kallgren

Carline Kallgren

Meredith, NH — Carline E. Kallgren died on September 8 after a long decline. She was 91. Carline was the second of three daughters born to Hilding and Margaret Johnson and grew up in and around Warwick, Rhode Island.

An avid musician her whole life, Carline and her sisters began piano lessons at a young age, and subsequently spent many happy summers at the New England Music Camp in Sidney, Maine.

She nearly convinced her parents to allow her to attend the University of Florida to study music, but in the end, she attended the University of Rhode Island where she earned a BSN degree.

On the day after Christmas in 1953 she married the love of her life, Richard "Dick" Kallgren, the handsome and charming cousin of her friends, the Ekstrands. Through their married years Dick and Carline lived in Connecticut, Illinois, Nebraska, Minnesota, and New Hampshire as Dick pursued his career as a Lutheran minister and later, high school science teacher.

They settled in Epsom, New Hampshire in 1969. Dick's untimely death in 1981 left Carline devastated, but in 1984 she informally married high school classmate Ray Wyss.

Together they had many grand adventures including trips to Alaska, Hawaii, Europe, and across much of the continental U.S. They were also gracious hosts, holding innumerable gatherings of family and friends at their home in Foster, Rhode Island and in later years in Gilmanton, New Hampshire. No get-together smorgasbord was complete without Carline's famous rice pudding, baked beans, or oatmeal-molasses bread.

Carline worked as the school nurse at Northwood Elementary School from 1970 until 1983. An ardent proponent of science-based, forthright health and sex education programming, Carline was often credited with single-handedly keeping the teen birthrate low in Northwood during her years as school nurse.

A talented piano and oboe player, she remained an active musician nearly her entire life, singing in and conducting various church choirs, and playing oboe for nearly 20 years with the New Hampshire Philharmonic Orchestra during the 1970s and 1980s.

Carline was a spunky and energetic woman. She lamented that she was not able to attend school in the post-Title 9 era as she loved team sports growing up, especially field hockey, and would have enjoyed playing more competitively.

In later years she enjoyed gardening and had a particular fondness for gladiolas. Loving, kind, patient and generous to a fault, Carline will be sorely missed by all who knew and loved her. She is survived by her two sisters, Gretchen and Peggy, four of her five children, Marcia (Rick), Janet (Cal), Jim (Sally) and Dan (Nancy), her daughter in law Sue Kallgren, 11 grandchildren, 7 great grandchildren, and numerous nieces and nephews. She was predeceased by her son Paul who died in October of 2020. She was buried in the New Rye Cemetery in Epsom on November 6 at a quiet family service.

A memorial service will be arranged at a later date.

If you get to heaven before we do, you'll find her at choir rehearsal, J.S. Bach at the organ, Dick in the baritone section beaming at her. Give her a hug from all of us, and tell her we'll be along by and by…