Kathleen A. Burke

Waltham – Mrs. Kathleen A. (Higgins) Burke, of Waltham, died Thursday, May 12, 2011 at Newton-Wellesley Hospital. She was 85.

Kathleen was born in Galway, Ireland on May 6, 1926, a daughter of the late Hugh and Mary (Bane) Higgins, and emigrated to the United States in her twenties. She lived in New York before moving to Waltham more than forty years ago. Until her retirement she worked as a nurse’s aide at the former Larchwood Lodge Nursing Home in Waltham.

The wife of the late Thomas A. Burke, she leaves her children, Mary Catherine Kittredge of West Boylston, Eileen Burke-Klein and her husband, Hal, of Los Alamitos, California, Sheila Oppenheim and her husband, Jon, and Patricia Giorgianni and her husband, Larry, all of Waltham, and Elizabeth Henderson and her husband, Derek, of Maynard; her brother and her sister, Michaeljoe Higgins and Nora Scarry, both of Ireland; 13 grandchildren and many nieces and nephews.

Family and friends will honor and remember Kathleen’s life by gathering to visit at 11 a.m. on Wednesday morning, May 18th, in The Joyce Funeral Home, 245 Main Street, (Rte. 20), Waltham where her funeral service will be held at 12 noon. Burial will follow in Saint Mary’s Cemetery, Needham.