Georgene J. Allen

Hastings resident Georgene J. Allen, 95, passed away of natural causes on Friday, April 19, 2024, at Good Samaritan Society, Grand Island, NE.    

Services will be 10:30 a.m. Friday, April 26, at First Presbyterian Church in Hastings with Rev. Bill Nottage-Tacey officiating. Burial will be at 3 p.m. Friday, April 26, at Grand Island Cemetery. Visitation will be 1-7 p.m. with family present 5-7 p.m. Thursday, April 25, at the funeral home, and one hour before the service at the church. In lieu of flowers, memorials can be made to Start Over Rover or the Second Presbyterian Church of Hastings. The service will be live-streamed on Livingston Butler Volland Funeral Home’s website. To view the service, go to Georgene’s obituary and click the play button shown towards the bottom of the page. 

Georgene “Gigi” was born Georgene Rasmussen on August 22, 1928 in Grand Island to her parents George R. and Elsie Marie (Aldrich) Rasmussen. She grew up in Grand Island and graduated from Grand Island High School in 1946. She attended a two-year college at Stevens College in Columbia, MO, and graduated in 1948. Georgene was then accepted to the prestigious Conservatory of Music at Oberlin College in Ohio. She studied voice and piano and received a Bachelor of Music degree in 1952. Music was extremely important to Georgene throughout her life: she joyously sang, played the piano, and arranged music.

Following graduation, she taught dancing at the Fred Astaire Studio in Cleveland, OH. Her love of Nebraska caused her to move back to teach music and dramatics in Bradshaw. On June 21, 1958, she married Robert M. Allen and moved to Hastings. They had three children: Kristin, Erik, and Bryant. A great deal of Georgene’s life was spent working with her husband in their “Superstore”, Allen’s of Hastings. Georgene went to work full-time in 1964 and ultimately became Manager of the Gift and Hallmark Gold Crown Department. She built one of the finest Hallmark card departments in the state and along with her husband, Robert, operated a large successful business that greatly benefited Hastings for over 62 years. Allen’s store gave Georgene a lifelong sense of purpose and its employees were an extended family to her. She could always be seen somewhere in the store where she worked until Allen’s sale to B&R Stores in 2020.   

Georgene also contributed to Hastings through her many local memberships and activities that included: President of Chapter HT PEO; Queen of the Daughters of the Nile; appointed Grand Representative to Minneapolis of the Daughters of the Nile; Regent of the Daughters of the American Revolution; member of the Hastings Good Samaritan Foundation Board of Directors; member of the National Good Samaritan Foundation Board of Directors, and member of the UNL Chancellor’s Club of the University of Nebraska Foundation.

Georgene was beloved by her four grandchildren: Ollie Allen Mui, Robert Allen Mui, Emery Allen, and Mattias Allen. As Ollie wrote last fall in a 9^th-grade English essay, “There are not enough words to describe my grandma. To name a few, she’s loving, protective, proud, and stubborn. I love everything about her.” In addition to her grandchildren, Georgene is survived by her daughter, Kristin (husband Denny Mui) of New York, NY; sons, Erik (wife Melanie) of Hastings and Bryant (wife Melissa) of Hastings; and nephew, David Fuller (wife Nancy) of Hastings. Georgene is preceded in death by her husband, Robert; parents, George and Elsie “Marie”; brother, James; sister, Jacquelyn; cat, Smokey Joe; and dogs, Shotzie and Brinkley.