Luitgard Lina “Lucky” Bowley (Frankenberger) passed away August 6, 2024 in her home surrounded by her loving family.
Luitgard was born June 17, 1931 in Wustuben, West Germany to the late Karl and Lisette Frankenberger. Luitgard met her future husband Albert E. Bowley, an American army soldier who was stationed in Germany during WWII.
After the conclusion of the war, Albert returned to Newport and a short time later Luitgard traveled alone to the United States to be with him. They were married on December 21, 1947 making her Newport’s first official “German war bride”. Once In Newport, Luitgard was given the nickname “Lucky” by her husband Al, a name she would be known by for the rest of her life.
Al and Lucky built their house together in 1952 and started a family. It was this home and family that provided Lucky with pride and joy every day of her life!
Lucky loved watching all her children and grandchildren as they participated in any and all activities. She loved cooking for the family and always made sure there was something available when you walked in the door. Nobody would ever go hungry. She also enjoyed working in her yard, her daily walks to the Cliff Walk, and shopping trips around the island. She exhibited a love for animals and in her later years took great joy sitting in the warm sun of her front door or the shade of her back porch watching the birds and rabbits in her beautiful yard filled with flowers that her grandson Kev kept looking so nice for her! She was also known to play traffic cop a little, monitoring the speed of the vehicles going by while sitting in the front doorway.
Lucky was a great cook! All her children and grandchildren especially enjoyed her famous doughboys! Lucky was also well known around town for her famous potato salad, coleslaw, and macaroni salad she would make for the original Sigs in the 5th ward!
Lucky spent 26 years working in the Newport school’s serving lunch to generations of Newporter’s with the RI state school lunch program.
Her beautiful smile, infectious laugh, a tireless work ethic and the ability to love unconditionally were her best qualities! She truly touched the lives of all that knew her!
Lucky leaves her six children, Karen Cordeiro (Jim), Albert “Tip” Bowley (Adele), William “Bill” Bowley (Caryn), Carl “Mouse” Bowley (Beth), Lisa Davis (Carl) and Christopher “Tiger” Bowley (Karolyn), 21 grandchildren, 26 great-grandchildren and 4 great-great grandchildren, her longtime companion Jim Dias, her siblings in Germany, sister Renate (Franz) and brothers Helmuth (Irene) and Edmund (Helga), along with several nieces and nephews.
Besides her parents, Lucky was preceded by her husband Albert and brothers Werner, Fritz, and Hans.
Lucky’s greatest attribute was her strong will to never quit and never give up no matter how tough a situation might be. Something she demonstrated right until the end!
She always put family first and has inspired all by the way she lived her life! They called her Lucky and Mom thought it was because she was Lucky to have all of us, but little did she know we were the Lucky ones!
The family would like to thank Debby, Nancy, Maggie, Avery, Mary and Judy for their friendship, support and care provided to Lucky during the past few years!
The family would also like to thank Visiting Nurse Home and Hospice and all the staff members who spent time compassionately caring for and helping Lucky during her times of need as well as the Townsend Foundation and Hillside Charitable Organization for their support in helping us keep our mom in her home during her final days.
Visiting hours will be held Sunday, August 11 from 3:00pm-6:00pm at the O’Neill-Hayes Funeral Home, 465 Spring St, Newport. A burial service will be held Monday, August 12 at Newport Memorial Park, 123 Howland Ave, Middletown at 11:00 am.
In lieu of flowers, donations in Lucky’s memory may be made to Townsend Planned Giving Program, https://childandfamilyri.org/townsend-planned-giving-program/ or Hillside Charitable Organization, https://www.hillsidecharitable.org/.
Newport’s Strategic Plan is limited, especially in “multimodal” transport. Maybe limiting the plan is practical since the City seems incapable of implementing the many very good plans that line the shelves of the Planning Department. I have seen minimal progress since I have lived here for 28 years.
The transportation plan focuses only on internal issues such as street paving, parking and bicycles. There is nothing about reducing traffic demand from outside the City, especially visitor car traffic in the summer. Such measures as promoting more bus service to and from Boston, for example, are missing. The loss of Peter Pan regular bus service to and from Boston is a huge adverse impact on the City. Now, Dattco is providing limited weekend service to and from Boston only during the summer. The RIPTA bus connection to Amtrak trains at the Kingston Station is minimal; the few buses that service the station/Newport connection is circuitous and takes 1h 25m. That’s unacceptable. RIPTA Service to the Wickford Junction MBTA commuter rail station is equally minimal or not advertised. In addition, there seems to be no support by the City for water transportation to Newport from Providence, and even that schedule caters to the Providence to Newport market rather than the reverse. Finally, there is no mention of remote parking with shuttle bus service to downtown Newport. This strategy has proven successful during major events such as Tall Ships. This option seems to have disappeared. With 95% of visitors coming to Newport in their cars, the existing meager public transit options are not enough. There is so much more that can be done to reduce the adverse impact on the City. The Strategic Plan is silent on real “multimodal” options.