Lynn A. Markert
On Christmas Day, 2023, a window in Concordia of Fox Chapel was opened to let the spirit of Lynn Adkins Markert fly free into the clear winter sky.
Lynn lived many lives before she flew out that window at the age of 90.
Born in Lima, Ohio, Lynn grew up during the second world war. While her father served in the navy, she spent her school years in central Ohio and her summers at Camp Milbrook in Maine as a camper and later as a counselor.
Lynn was a piano prodigy at a young age. She played with the Dover Orchestra at the age of fourteen and was accepted into the Juilliard School of Music. But not content with the thought of sitting behind a piano for years, Lynn decided to study languages at Antioch College and Ohio State University.
After saving money from part-time jobs, Lynn traveled to Lima, Peru for her junior year. Rather than return to Ohio, she sold her ticket and traveled over land to Brazil, a weeks long trip by truck, boat and boxcar that would have been unthinkable for a young woman at the time. Lynn arrived in São Paulo, found a job as a translator for Price Waterhouse and stayed for over three years learning Portuguese, playing piano, riding horses and corresponding with people in multiple languages.
Lynn came home to find her mother dying of cancer, and after caring for her mother for six months learned to fly as a private pilot and flew cross country to New England.
A year later Lynn married Neil Guda, an enthusiastic young architect from Cleveland and had two children, Brooke and Nelson. While raising their children, Lynn worked as a writer and put herself through school, finally obtaining a chemical engineering degree from Case Western Reserve University and then striking out on her own as her two children were entering college for themselves.
Lynn went on to earn a master’s degree in Environmental Engineering from The University of Akron, worked in environmental consulting for several years and then found a job with Bridgestone-Firestone in Akron, Ohio where she met her second husband, George Markert and gained a loving second family in the process.
In their retirement, Lynn and George traveled extensively, visiting friends and family, including exploring the US and Europe, Puerto Rico, and Central America until George’s death in 2015.
In her last years on earth, Lynn lived independently near her daughter in Pittsburgh, enjoying daily walks along the river and watching the moon from her balcony. She was a lover of music, books and languages, and behind her quiet modesty was an independent thinker who shaped her own life and those of her children.
Lynn’s two children were by her side for most of her last month on the earth. Even as her body failed, she played piano until almost the last day when she flew into the Christmas sky, a trail of music and memories in her wake.
Lynn was predeceased by her parents, Ray and Olive Adkins, her brother, Sam, and her husbands, Neil Guda and George Markert. She is survived by her children, Brooke Molina and Nelson Guda, her step-children, Frank Markert and Liz Dennis, her sixteen grandchildren, and her two great-grandchildren.
Lynn’s ashes will be spread, perhaps over years to come due to her travels, at places we believe were meaningful to her. Professional Services by Thomas M. Smith Funeral Home & Crematory Ltd., Pittsburgh, PA
www.thomasmsmithfh.com