Gertrude Reinders Singer died on Wednesday, June 2, at her home for the past four years, the Bell Trace Senior Living Community in Bloomington, Ind. She was 90.
Born on Jan. 28, 1920, in Orange City, Iowa, to Jeanette Van Peursem Reinders and Bruinis Reinders, she attended Northwestern Classical Academy and Northwestern Junior College and graduated at the age of 18. She then taught in one-room schools for three years in the local community, and completed her education at Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in business in 1943. During World War II she trained in Chicago as one of the first women air traffic controllers and was assigned to the South Bend, Ind., airport. There she met her future husband, Julius C. Singer, who was working for Bendix as an experimental pilot. They were married on August 18, 1945 and spent 25 happy years together. After Julius died in 1970, Trude returned to business school to polish her skills. She then worked in a number of South Bend businesses, traveled extensively and was an active volunteer. She moved to Bloomington in 2006.
In addition to Julius, she was predeceased by her parents, her second father, Evert Reinders, and her sister Sebianne Popma.
She is survived by two daughters, Judith Royster and her husband James, of Middle Haddam, Conn., and Andrea Singer and her husband Roger Beckman, of Bloomington, Ind.; three grandchildren, Jeremy Royster and his wife Dayna, Erin Robidoux and her husband Michael, and Nathaniel Beckman and his fiancee Evelyn Marrett; and five great-grandchildren, Juliet, Justin, Ginger and Alec Royster and Nicholas Robidoux. She also is survived by three siblings, John B. Reinders, Bernard Reinders and his wife, Lorna, and Everly Visser, all of Orange City, Iowa, as well as Delbert Popma (husband of Sebianne), and many beloved nieces and nephews.
A memorial service will be held on June 25 in her church of 61 years in South Bend, Ind., and she will be interred next to Julius in the Riverview Cemetery.
Memorial contributions may be made to St. Peter’s United Church of Christ, 915 Ironwood Drive, South Bend, Ind., 46615 or to a charity of one’s choice.
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