Gail Ann Wagner Zimmer
July 23, 1946 — October 22, 2014
Gail Ann Wagner Zimmer left the main stage dancing with a glass of her favorite champagne close in hand on October 22, 2014 . Her death was hastened by cancer. She was born July 23, 1946 in Shamokin and graduated from Ashland High School and Geisinger’s School of Nursing. Although she was fiercely proud of her Coal Country roots, she spent most of her adult life in her beloved Danville/Riverside area.
Professionally, Gail was a neurosurgery scrub nurse, and she couldn’t believe anyone would pay her to have that much fun. Her career spanned hospitals in Bryn Mawr, Hanover, NH, and Danville.
She was passionate about the arts and dabbled in many media. Her crocheted afghans swaddled many infants and provided warmth for nursing home residents. It gave her great pleasure to know that her crocheted snowflakes decorated Christmas trees throughout the world and that her exquisite Ukrainian Easter eggs, harbingers of spring and symbols of renewal, were widely admired and coveted. One of her greatest pleasures was collecting objects of beauty made by local artisans, and she filled her home with them.
A voracious reader, Gail read everything from cereal boxes to Russian literature, from history to the latest fiction, usually while brushing her teeth.
The word “procrastination” was not in her vocabulary; the words “organized” and “prepared” were.
She is survived by her loving husband, Bill (whom she taught to love spinach), her son, Alec, of Watertown, MA, (of whom she often said if she knew what she had done right, she’d have written a book), Alec’s darling wife, Elisabeth, and Gail’s legacy to the future, her young grandson, Brent.
She was preceded in death by her mother Jean Klock Van Es.
She urged us all to cherish relationships, support the arts and local libraries, and practice random acts of kindness.
The family suggests memorial contributions be made to the American Cancer Society, Union County Unit, 57 Reitz Blvd. Suite 102, Lewisburg, PA 17837.