Irma Louise Henrichs Weber was born 19 January 1928, in Ft. Wayne, Indiana and died in Christ on Friday, 22 November 2019 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin at age 92. She was preceded in death by her husband of forty-nine years, Rev. Eugene Weber who died on 23 December 1998. She is survived by her four children, Miriam Anto (Milwaukee, WI), Karen Robinson-Weber (Beijing, China), David Weber (Valparaiso, IN) and Thomas Weber (Milwaukee, WI) along with 9 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren.
Mom was a Physical Education teacher who enjoyed tennis, skiing (winner of the Birkebeiner 31-mile cross-country ski race, being the only finisher in the over-75 age-group) tennis, fishing, biking and swimming with Miriam at the YMCA. She raised a huge vegetable garden and four children who were pressed into indentured servitude as weeders and, on their day off, as ball-boys. Once retired, Mom taught English as a Second Language in Siberia, Russia, biked through Germany and visited Karen in China to play tennis.
When Mom was not playing, she was cooking. In her final days, moving in and out of lucidity, she blurted out, “How can you be named Irma Weber and not be cooking supper?” For years Coach Grandma, cooked meals for Tom’s tennis team, especially enjoying the week of Spring training at Hilton Head, SC.
Evident in subtle and humble ways, the Church was Mom’s gravitational center. She was a connoisseur of the sermon, being most appreciative of preaching that helped her think about the Biblical text. And she loved the sound of brass at the festival services.
Mom’s favorite Old Testament text (we’d joke) was Genesis 41:46 which reads, “Joseph was thirty years old when he began serving in Pharaoh’s courts.” (It’s never too late to learn tennis.) Not one to question St. Paul, still, Mom did not agree that “the greatest is love,” rather thinking the greatest is “point, game, set and match.” In her last months, we’d meet up at Alexian Village in time for Happy hour and an inexpensive delicious meal which we charged to her room. Once we teased her that it was the drinks and food that drew us to see her. Her well-timed reply was, “I know.” In so many ways, we will miss her as we await the sound of the last trumpet heralding our reunion at the promised resurrection to eternal life.
