Karen Salmon Klarman, 62, a public schoolteacher in Merchantville and then in Pennsauken from 1992 to 2010, died of lung cancer on Sunday, Jan. 19, at her home in Cherry Hill. Born in New York City, she graduated from Freeport (L.I.) High School in 1969, earned a bachelor's in sociology at Molloy College in Rockville Centre, N.Y., in 1973, and later a master's in the art of teaching from Marygrove College in Detroit.
Mrs. Klarman was a buyer for the Macy's headquarters store in Manhattan from 1974 to 1976, then a buyer for the Lit Brothers department store in Center City Philadelphia, before leaving to raise her family, her husband, Edward, said in a phone interview. In the mid-1980s, she became a tax preparer for a national firm for a year, before running her own tax-preparation firm from her home, from the late 1980s to the early 1990s. Then her teaching career began.
She "taught seventh grade, mostly math and science," in the Merchantville School District from 1992 to 1994, her husband said. Until she retired in 2010, she then taught in Pennsauken, first in sixth grade at the former Central School. When it closed, she taught at the Howard M. Phifer Middle School, he said.
Besides her husband, she is survived by her mother, Lillian Salmon, son Brandon, daughters Valerie Franck and Darien Saft, and seven grandchildren.
A visitation was set from 6 to 8 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 26, and again from 9:15 to 10:15 a.m. Monday, Jan. 27, both at the Schetter Funeral Home, 304 W. Marlton Pike, Cherry Hill, before a Funeral Mass at 11 a.m. at Christ Our Light Church, 402 Kings Highway North, Cherry Hill, with interment in Colestown Cemetery. Donations may be sent to the Foundation for Prader-Willi Research, Dept. LA 23216, Pasadena, Calif., 91185-3216 or www.fpwr.org.
Condolences may be offered at www.schetterfh.com.