Virginia Newhall, 87, Lake Forest

Virginia Doepke Newhall passed away peacefully in her Lake Forest home surrounded by her family on Monday, September 9. Known as "Ginnie" (or "Ginu" to family and childhood friends), she was born June 18, 1937, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Virginia Smith Doepke and Fred Charles Doepke.

Ginnie attended Milwaukee Downer Seminary from preschool through high school and graduated from Vassar College in 1959.

Ginnie is survived by her daughters Ann Walters (Jeff) and Virginia Rademacher, (Richard), and seven grandchildren, David Walters (Gina), Eliza Johnson (Mark), Charles Walters (Grace), Emily, Susanna, Grace, and Lily Rademacher, and seven great-grandchildren, Rosemary, Samuel, and Frances Walters, Theodore, Alice, and James Johnson, and Elizabeth Walters. Ginnie's older sister and lifelong best friend, Ann Doepke Miller, died in 2020.

Her beloved husband, David Newhall, died in 1996. David and Ginnie met at a party in Milwaukee where Ginnie slyly changed the place cards to make sure she was seated next to the dashing young man from Marblehead, Massachusetts she had spotted during cocktail hour, thus possibly breaking the heart of her actual date. They married in 1959, and ultimately settled in Rhode Island where they raised their daughters.

Family always came first, but Ginnie had boundless energy for civic involvement, more than we can list here. She served as an elected representative on the Barrington School Committee; she taught in the public schools, enjoying most her time directing the gifted program; and later, after moving to New London, New Hampshire, became active in the Lake Sunapee Region VNA and Hospice Care program.

For many summers, Ginnie gamely joined her husband and family as they cruised on their 30-foot sailboat (the "Ginu") throughout New England waters, but after twenty years, Ginnie and David built a summer home on Lake Sunapee in New Hampshire, a place that reminded Ginnie of idyllic childhood vacations in Wisconsin’s North Woods. This became a special gathering place where happy memories were made.

As a relatively young widow, Ginnie was remarkable in building a vibrant and independent life. She lived in Hilton Head, South Carolina, for many years before moving to Lake Forest to be close to family. Wherever she went, her homes were overflowing with family photos and mementoes, powerful reminders of a life well lived and loved.

Besides her family and dear friends, she loved dogs, pinot grigio, real maple syrup, gadgets of all kinds, books, her fireplace, watching songbirds on her patio and loons on the lake, yellow roses, Christmas, a neat and tidy home, steak cooked "just pink", and, at the end of her life, her wonderful caregivers who treated her with so much dignity and kindness.

Donations in Ginnie's memory may be made to the Lake Sunapee Protective Association or the Lake Sunapee Region VNA & Hospice.

A celebration of life will be held at 11:00am on Saturday, November 30th, 2024 at Lake Forest Place.

Info: www.wenbanfh.com or (847)234-0022.