Lorena Grace Fanning, age 87, passed away peacefully September 11, 2024 from Alzheimer’s disease.

Lorena was born on January 3rd 1937, in Rapid City South Dakota to Paul and Elaine Berry. Lorena grew up on her family’s ranch, the middle of five children. She once wrote “My older brother was my best friend. We spent a lot of time roaming the countryside. I developed a creative free spirit.” She loved the outdoors, and she loved animals, especially their quarter horses. Besides practical life skills, her father taught her to ride and she was an excellent horsewoman, skilled in barrel racing, and calf roping. In 1954 she was the South Dakota High School Rodeo Queen and traveled to Texas for a national competition. In 1956 she married her high school sweetheart Norton Tucker and in 1960 and they moved with their two little girls to Roseville Minnesota. They later had two more daughters. Lorena was a very hardworking and industrious lady. She would tackle any project around the house and yard. She was an urban homesteader. Her organic vegetable garden was amazing, she could grow anything and enjoyed preserving her produce. Family and friends enjoyed maple syrup she made from tapping trees. Lorena was also an excellent seamstress. She would sew clothing for the girls and later became an accomplished quilter. Creative and artistic, she enjoyed decorating and various craft projects including intricate scroll saw work. She was involved with 4H, Girl Scouts and Homemakers club. Professionally she worked as a bookkeeper. Divorced, Lorena later returned to South Dakota where she found love again with a friend from her high school days. Lorena and Joel “Dick” Fanning were married August 27th 1996. She was happy to be married again enjoying country life on a ranch with Dick near Longvalley SD. After Dicks sudden death in 2008 Lorena moved briefly to Wisconsin near her daughter Sue and then later back to Minnesota to Memory care near Tracy. She had a sweet and gentle spirit. Jesus was her Lord and Savior, and she is now with him, at peace in her eternal home.

Lorena is survived by her four daughters: Tracy (Jim) Timp, Sue (Randy) Kostroski, Laurie Lerner (Jim Sleer), Angela Tucker, step children: Morgan (James) Chadwick, Regan Kirchner, and Shane Fanning, and seven grandchildren, three step grandchildren and ten great grandchildren, brothers Keith (Bunny) Berry, Ray Berry, and sister Coleen (Mike) Kayras, and many nieces and nephews.
She was preceded in death by her husband Dick Fanning, her parents and her sister Beverly Page, sister-in-law Gail Berry and stepson Sloan Fanning.

We invite friends and family to join us for a memorial service, held in her honor, at the Belvidere Community Church on October 19 at 11:00 a.m. A light luncheon will follow at the Community Center.