Gerda Sanders

Rome, GA - Gerda Grimmer Sanders, 72, died January 1, 2006.
Graveside services will be Wednesday, January 3, 2007, at 2:00 PM at Oaknoll Memorial Gardens, Rome, GA. The family will receive friends from 12:00 PM until service time at Daniels Funeral Home.
Gerda Johanna Grimmer Sanders was born on August 4, 1934, in Bennewitz, Germany, to Emil Paul Grimmer and Elise Emma Jakob Grimmer. She lived outside the village of Wurzen, which became occupied by the communists after World War II. Unable to succumb to the oppression of the new regime, she escaped into West Germany, forced to leave behind her beloved family and first-born daughter, Uta. She lived outside of Munich for a number of years, until she was forbidden by authorities to return across the East German border. In 1961, she emigrated to the United States where she married Julian Earl Sanders of Rome, Georgia, whom she had met while he was stationed in Munich. She gave birth to a dearly beloved daughter, Kelly Katharina, and continued to raise her after being widowed in 1978. Gerda became a citizen of the U.S. in 1968, and in 1986, was able to return to East Germany for a visit, after a 30-year exile. Gerda worked for the Colonial Baking Company in Rome until her retirement in 1999. Survivors include her daughter, Uta Wohlmacher, her husband and her children, Ona and John, of Germany; her daughter, Kelly Sanders and her husband Domingo Ortiz and their two children, Justus and Anna Grace, of Athens, Georgia; her sister and brother-in-law, Anni Grimmer and Herbert Schemmel of Wurzen, Germany, and her brother and sisters-in-law, Marshall and Jackie Fox, of Rome Georgia, and Evelyn Monson, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Daniel's Funeral Home in Rome, Georgia has charge of the arrangements.