LEWISBURG -- Gertrude Hartung Boyer, 94, passed away on Friday, Nov. 6, 2009, in Carlisle. She was a native of Mount Clemens, Mich., and a 60-year resident of Lewisburg.

Gertrude Boyer was the daughter of the late Isaac A. Hartung of Pittsburgh and Gertrude S. Hartung ( Schaaf) of Mount Clemens, Mich.. Her father had been in the hotel business in Mount Clemens, a resort town in its day, and head of the Macomb County Michigan Red Cross.

She married Charles D. Boyer at the First Presbyterian Church in Mount Clemens on Dec. 26, 1940, just two years before Mr. Boyer left for war duty in the Pacific Theater as captain of a Navy attack transport ship. Her husband was the proprietor of the Lewisburg Western Auto store from 1949 to 1972, and the proprietor of Sun Graphics Printing of Sunbury and Lewisburg, from 1973 to 1995, died in 1997. He was 86.

Gertrude graduated from Mount Clemens High School, Class of 1933, and from Eastern Michigan University, Class of 1937. She earned a bachelor of arts degree with a triple major in English, history and business, earning more than 190 college credits -- an extraordinary amount of credits at the time and even by today's standards. In high school, she took additional studies in ballet, languages, and astronomy, and worked on the school newspaper. From her background in astronomy, she was one of the first public school teachers to teach students about the red shift and the Doppler effect in wave mechanics, used in determining the age of stars and the universe.

Mrs. Boyer taught high school in public schools in Michigan and Pennsylvania for more than 16 years. After starting her family of four children, she returned to work at Lewisburg High School for a number of years as a full-time substitute teacher in English, social studies, and business. A life-long supporter of the Republican Party, she often emphasized the basics of job and value creation through private enterprise with limited government interference as the best source of long-term prosperity for the greatest number of citizens.

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Mrs. Boyer devoted the majority of her time to raising her four children, Gertrude B. Ferguson, of Carlisle, Charles H. Boyer, of Phillips, Maine, Margaret B. Pursell, of Boalsburg, and Susan C. Randow ,of Stevensville, Md. She saw all four through college and university, whence they became, respectively, a school teacher and administrator, a writer, a university professor, and a school teacher and reading specialist.

She was a Cub Scout den mother for several years, and a Girl Scout leader for eight years. An active member of the First Presbyterian Church in Lewisburg for a number of years, Mrs. Boyer represented the women of the church at conferences across the country. She was also one of the organizers of the church's long-regarded tureen suppers and annual raspberry festival.

In addition to her children, she is survived by one sister, Selma Marie Ball, of Macomb County, Mich.; nine grandchildren, Heather Rose, of Mt. Holly Springs, Debra Ferguson, of Carlisle, Jaye Boyer, of Atlanta, Ga., Zachary Pursell, of New Orleans, La., Matthew Pursell, Lynn Garskof, and Adam Pursell, of Centre County, Amanda Randow, of Seattle, Wash., and Michael Randow of Hood River, Ore.

Mrs. Boyer will be remembered at a public memorial service at 2 p.m. Saturday led by the Rev. James King at the First Presbyterian Church, 8 Market St., Lewisburg. A reception will follow at the Lewisburg Hotel.

Internment will be at the Clinton Grove Cemetery, Mount Clemens next to her husband of 56 years, Charles D. Boyer. That ceremony is scheduled for early August of 2010.