Patti (Rattlingourd) Kunkel

Patti Kunkel began her adventure 58 years ago in Salt Lake City, Utah as Patti Rattlingourd.  She received her bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Utah and a Master’s degree in Entomology from Michigan State University.  She moved to Kentucky and worked as a lab technologist in a stored grain entomology laboratory, where she eventually met and married Brian Kunkel.  Her adventures took her to Ohio to work as an entomology and soils lab technician and to Macon, Georgia as a biology and medical terminology instructor at a community college. The most recent adventure brought her to Delaware where she worked as a lab technician for DuPont and the University of Delaware.  She eventually worked several part-time jobs after funding for her laboratory positions had depleted.  She attended the University of Delaware and obtained additional education in the diet and nutrition field. 

Throughout all of her adventures, she was an enthusiastic gamer, member of the Entomological Society of America, and planted various plants to observe the insects or birds that visited them.  Patti’s biggest fight was against the various medical issues that assaulted her during her life and ultimately, they caused her death at home on 2 February 2023 in Bear, Delaware.  She is survived by her co-adventurer and husband, Brian Kunkel, her parents Glen and Donna Rattlingourd, her sisters - Sheryl Howard and Karin Herrmann, and her nocturnal eagle-eyed sugar glider Cheyenne.

A visitation for Patti will be held on Friday, February 10, 2023 from 11:00 am – 12:00 pm at Beeson Funeral Home, 2053 Pulaski Highway, Newark, DE 19702. A funeral service will follow at 12:00 pm at Beeson Funeral Home. Interment will be private at a later date. 

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