City of Oaks Funeral Home & Cremation
Obituary
Kris Murawski
Raleigh, North Carolina
Age 95.
Died 09/25/2025.
Retired hematologist, father, and grandfather, Kris Murawski, 95, died from a sudden illness in Raleigh, NC, on September 25, 2025.
A native of Warsaw, Poland, Krzysztof Wojciech Murawski witnessed the Nazi occupation of Poland as a child and the subsequent Communist takeover in his youth. During World War II, his family fled to safety in the Polish countryside, first in 1939, in the wake of the Nazi invasion, and then in 1944 during the Polish Uprising against the Nazi occupiers.
Dr. Murawski graduated in 1953 from the Warsaw Medical School, followed by a postgraduate degree in biochemistry. He married Sylvia Anna Winawer, a civil law attorney, in 1958. He served as the Head of the Department of Biochemistry and Director of Research at the Institute of Hematology in Warsaw. His research interests included molecular and genetic variants and abnormalities of blood proteins.
In 1969, Dr. Murawski and his wife, Sylvia, left Poland along with their two young boys, John and Anthony. That January, sacrificing their citizenship and most of their possessions, the family, along with other political emigrees, boarded a departing train in Warsaw. As the train approached the Austrian border, Dr. Murawski expected Communist agents to arrest him and prevent his emigration. When the train crossed the border without incident, he realized he was finally free. The family stayed in Rome for four months awaiting permission to come to America before immigrating to the United States through New York’s John F. Kennedy airport. A decade later, at the age of 50, he became a United States citizen.
In the United States, Dr. Murawski worked at the national office of the American Red Cross from 1971 to 1995 in several management and executive responsibilities, including as Associate Director, Blood Services.
In retirement, he was President of PAHA, an association of Polish physicians in the Washington, DC, area, and also served as President of the Federation of Polish Medical Organizations in the 1990s and remained active in the group for the rest of his life.
As a retiree, Dr. Murawski traveled to Peru, China, Egypt, Israel, India, and Europe. In 2014, he moved to Raleigh, NC, to be near family. He was particularly fond of opera, attending Metropolitan Opera simulcasts, and developed a taste for live bluegrass. Remarkably, as he was going blind in his 90s, he taught himself how to use voice activation features and multi-finger prompts to continue using his iPad and iPhone. He listened to audiobooks in English, Polish, and occasionally Russian.
He will be dearly missed by his son John, daughter-in-law Marceline (Raleigh, NC), and granddaughters Suzanna (New York, NY) and Julia (Raleigh, NC), as well as his son Anthony and grandsons Ben and Liam (Seattle, WA). Donations in his memory may be made to the JC Raulston Arboretum (contact Alycia Thornton at 919-513-7068) or the Metropolitan Opera at https://www.metopera.org/support/make-a-gift/support-extraordinary-opera/.
For additional information or for service details, please reach out to the family directly.
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City of Oaks Cremation and Funeral Home is a full-service funeral home in Raleigh, serving all of North Carolina and beyond. We provide an alternative to costly funeral homes and every day we help families in Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill and all over North Carolina make simple, affordable funeral arrangements.
Simply having to reach out to a funeral home can feel overwhelming. Our goal is to simplify the entire funeral home experience and make the process as easy as possible. We hope to eliminate any unnecessary surprises by publishing our total cost and the services we provide directly on our website. All of our obituaries are provided free of charge as a way to help families celebrate and commemorate the lives of their loved ones.
Our Promise
Apples to Apples
Just like all other licensed funeral homes in North Carolina, City of Oaks Cremation, LLC is regulated by the NC Board of Funeral Service.
The same laws that apply to the big corporate funeral homes also apply to the modest independently owned firms like ours. All crematories in North Carolina, regardless of who owns them, are inspected annually by the state and must adhere to the same rules and laws.
Genuine Care
We're committed to providing families within our community unsurpassed service before, during and after the time of loss.
Our staff will provide clear communication to your family through each step as we move forward from the original phone call notifying us of a death to the time we deliver the urn back to your family. We will treat your family with the utmost respect, as we honor the wishes of your loved one.
We promise to make this process affordable and as endurable as possible.
State Wide
Our Funeral Home is located in Wake County NC; however, we provide our services to families throughout the entire State.
Unlike other funeral homes, we don't charge an additional mileage fee. Regardless of what county you live in, we can help your family with making simple, affordable funeral arrangements. From Asheville to Wilmington, we're proud to help families statewide.
Our Services
$1196.75
Nobody likes surprise costs added in at the last minute. We guarantee you will not find any hidden charges here. We include everything you need for a simple or direct cremation. Simple, affordable and reliable. We have not changed the cost of our direct cremation service since we opened City of Oaks in 2012.
$2875.66
We offer the option of choosing how you receive your loved ones remains. Selecting our Direct Cremation with Solidified Remains option is a beautiful way to transform cremated remains into 40-60 “stones” that you can hold.
$1917.84
City of Oaks Funeral Home and Cremation provides an affordable cremation option with onsite visitation. Nobody likes surprise costs added in at the last minute. We guarantee you will not find any hidden charges here. Simple, affordable and reliable.
$2497.50
An immediate burial has the same end result as a traditional burial; however, we have eliminated the extra (sometimes unnecessary) services prior to getting to the cemetery. Not everyone wants an open casket for viewing or a limousine for the family. Despite the term immediate, we can move as fast as you need or as slow as you like. This option simply allows you to save money by eliminating some of the fancy extras at the funeral home.
$6081.48
We offer the same traditional funeral services as the big corporately owned funeral homes in the area; however, we cost about half the amount. You might consider a traditional funeral service if your family is looking for an open casket visitation, a traditional church service or a funeral service in the funeral home's chapel. A traditional funeral service can be altered to fit the needs of your family.
$3033.75
This establishment is one of a select number of funeral homes who meet the criteria for providing green funeral service by the Green Burial Council; a tax-exempt, nonprofit organization working to encourage environmentally sustainability in the field of funeral service. Our Green options allow for a funeral to take place without the use of toxic and non-biodegradable materials/chemicals.
$2640.59
As an alternative to traditional cremation, City of Oaks Funeral Home also offers Aquamation. The Aquamation process, often referred to as alkaline hydrolysis, uses a solution of water and potassium hydroxide to facilitate natural decomposition.
$1596.75
City of Oaks Funeral Home and Cremation provides an affordable cremation with a private family viewing. A private family viewing allows up to 10 immediate family members or friends to spend time with a loved one when a public visitation is not preferred.