Johanna "Hans" Mak, 86, Potsdam

POTSDAM — Johanna ("Hans") Mak, born 16 November, 1935 to Johanna Hissink and Gerard Mak, died peacefully at home surrounded by family after a brief illness.

Born in Amsterdam, Holland, she endured the hardships of the second World War as a young girl, watching neighbors being deported, her mother imprisoned for aiding a family escape to Switzerland, while her father tried to shield her from starvation.

After the war, as a teenager, she worked in London and later in Corsica to learn English and French.

Hitch-hiking home, she met her future husband, Pim Tirion.

Together they would raise 3 children.

However, Holland proved too small for her adventurous spirit, and Hans moved with her 3 teenage children to Texas.

Unable to remain in the US on tourist visas, she moved with her children to Australia and Hong Kong for several years until able to secure the green cards that finally allowed her to live and work in the country of her dreams: the United States.

Returning to Texas, Hans opened a flower and plant maintenance business, using the skills of flower arranging she had learned in the Sogetsu School of Ikebana in Japan.

After 10 years, she sold this business and followed her youngest daughter to Boston. Here she went to Chaplaincy school as well as Ministerial School.

With her chaplaincy degree she worked in the Boston City Hospital and Mass General Hospital during the height of the AIDS epidemic, supporting patients as well as their caregivers for many years.

As minister, she started the Unity Church of Somerville, MA, which she ran with a colleague, Henry Burrell, for 10 years, until she retired and moved with her husband to southern CA.

She loved the incredibly beautiful vistas, weather and beaches of the west coast for two decades, until declining health forced her to move back East.

Frail, she moved in with her daughter in Potsdam, NY, her "home away from home," as she felt very much at home in the North Country.

Hans made the world a better place.

She leaves behind a husband, Ronald Kransdorf in Boston MA, a daughter Kirn-Majolie (Guruchander) Khalsa in Santa Fe, NM, a son Pieter-Gerard (Raleigh) Tirion in Smithville, TX, a daughter Monique (Dani) ben Avraham-Tirion in Potsdam, NY, as well as 4 stepsons, 5 grandchildren and numerous friends all over the globe.

A memorial service will be organized.

In lieu of flowers, donations to the Humane Society would honor her memory.

Thoughts, memories and condolences can be shared with the Mak family at www.garnerfh.com.

Arrangements are with the Garner Funeral Service.