Helen Patricia Dukas

1920 - 2025

Helen Patricia Dukas, 104, of Kingston, passed away on Sunday, 23 March 2025, at Allied Services Hospice, Meade Street, Wilkes-Barre, surrounded by family members.

Helen was born on 19 November 1920 in Kingston, Pa., to Mollie Zielinski Cizeski and Xavier Cizeski. She attended both public and parochial elementary schools before graduating as an honor student from Kingston High School in 1938.

She got married in September 1941, about three months prior to the start of US involvement in World War II. While her husband was overseas fighting in Europe, Helen moved in with her in-laws, and like many other people of that time, she put her life on hold until the end of the war in 1945. After the war, she and her husband moved to Kingston where they successfully raised three children.

Helen's children were always amazed that she seemed to know everyone in town, until she explained that it was due to a combination of two reasons: (1) various family moves as a child resulted in her living next-door to a lot of different people, and (2) selling tickets at her in-laws' movie theater, the Grand Theatre in Edwardsville, enabled her to meet a lot of the townspeople!

During her daughters' pre-teen years, Helen was the leader of a Brownie scout troop. And all of her children still have fond memories of those days, because many people would order Girl Scout cookies but fail to pick them up and pay for them; so, Helen had to eat the cost of those cookies, and her children "had to" eat the actual cookies!

Helen was extremely empathetic and, as such, was a great listener and "sounding board," especially for her children and their friends, who to this day still refer to her as "Mom"!

Helen had an eclectic job experience which included working in the Duplan Silk Mill before marriage. During the war, she did office work for the Selective Service System, and later, for various dress factories, and she was also the ticket seller in her in-laws' movie theater. After the war, she continued with the dress factory and movie jobs, then worked part-time in the Post Office during Christmas rush, and finally secured an office management job with Nationwide Tire Company in Wilkes-Barre, her last place of employment before retiring.

Helen had many interests, foremost among them was spending time with family members to just idly visit or to play cards or board games. She was a huge fan of murder mystery stories in novels, on TV, and in movies. She was a voracious reader well into her early 100s, and she especially liked the novels of Robert Ludlum, James Patterson, and Jonathan Kellerman. She also loved the British mysteries on PBS Masterpiece Theatre, and various police procedure shows on Network TV.

Helen also loved to travel, especially on cruises with her husband. Travel locations included the contiguous USA, Alaska, Hawaii, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, Panama Canal, and Europe.

On being an octogenarian: When asked how she got to be over 100 years old, Helen would always say it was because of her "Junk Food" diet! For her 100th birthday celebration, her children held a Zoom meeting with family members across the country; during the meeting, one cousin asked her what was the most incredible thing she remembers from her first 100 years. She said that it was being let out of her schoolroom as a child to watch an airplane fly overhead for the first time, thus witnessing the beginning of a new era! Many years later, on a trip to visit her son at Edwards AFB, she got to sit in the cockpit of a prototype YF-16 jet aircraft, and witness the beginning of yet another new era!

Helen was preceded in death by her parents, her husband Louis J. Dukas, her daughter Diane Dukas Coleman, and her grandson Brian James Coleman.

She is survived by her son James L. Dukas, daughter Dena (Ron) Buckley, grandson Charles (Danielle) Coleman, great granddaughters Chelsea and Katelyn Coleman, and numerous nieces and nephews.

A Mass of Christian Burial will be held Friday, 28 March 2025 at 10 a.m. from St. Ignatius Loyola Church, 339 N. Maple Ave., Kingston. Msgr. David Tressler will serve as officiant. Friends may call Thursday from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at Harold C. Snowdon Home for Funerals, Inc., 420 Wyoming Ave., Kingston. All are asked to go directly to church on the day of funeral.

Memorial donations may be made to the charity of your choice.

Helen was blessed with good genes, and a photographic memory, which was extremely helpful when compiling a genealogical family tree! She was intelligent, smart, witty, and inquisitive. She was empathetic, loving, and caring. She was also beautiful on the inside and outside. And she was a lot of fun to be around! In fact, we are biased enough to think that she was the best Mom in the world! We love you and will miss you tremendously, Mom! And when you reach your final destination, maybe you'll finally discover the answer to the mystery of who really stole the cookies in the cookie jar! MWAH!