Sheridan Wobus, 66
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Sheridan "Sherry" Wobus, 66, of Grandview Drive died Sunday, June 13, 2010, at home after a short and courageous battle with brain cancer.
Born in Humboldt, Tenn., on Aug. 16, 1943, daughter of Margaret W. Whitcher of Kansas City, Mo., and the late Edward J. Whitcher, she attended schools in Appleton, Wisc., and Prairie Village, Kan., before graduating from the University of Kansas with a degree in education in 1965.
Mrs. Wobus was an administrator for the Williams Center for Development Economics for 20 years. She also had taught fourth grade for two years at Pine Cobble School after moving to Williamstown in 1967.
She will be remembered for her winning smile and cheerful disposition, which brightened the lives of her family, friends and neighbors. This spirit lives on in all corners of the world, in the hundreds of students she worked with at the CDE and remembered by hundreds of Williams alumni for her role in nearly 30 travel-study programs, which she and her husband, Reinhard A. "Bud" Wobus, led in this country and abroad.
Mrs. Wobus was also a very active member of the broader community. She was a town member of the Williams Choral Society, and later the Northern Berkshire Chorale. She was a volunteer for the Sonsini Animal Shelter in Pittsfield and the Bill Koch ski league, at which she helped teach young children Nordic skiing. She kept her positive attitude even through the devastating illness that was diagnosed only in April, her own life brightened by visits from friends, family, and her two grandchildren, Ethan and Elise. She was a loving wife and mother.
She and her husband met as camp counselors at Sanborn Western Camps in Florissant, Colo., in the summer of 1964. They were married in Kansas City on March 18, 1967, and returned to Williamstown, where Bud was a new faculty member at Williams.
Besides her husband and grandchildren, she leaves two sons, Erik Wobus of Williamstown and Cameron Wobus of Boulder, Colo.; a brother, Edward Wright Whitcher, and a sister, Margaret Eleanor Whitcher of Kansas City.
FUNERAL NOTICE — A memorial service celebrating the life of Mrs. Wobus will be held at St. John's Episcopal Church on Park Street in Williamstown on Friday, June 18, at 11, followed by a reception. A private family burial will be held at the Williams College cemetery.
There will be no calling hours. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations can be made to the VNA & Hospice of Northern Berkshire, the Oncology Center of Southwestern Vermont Medical Center in Bennington, or St. John's Episcopal Church. Donations should be made through Flynn & Dagnoli-Montagna Home for Funerals, Central Chapels, 74 Marshall St., North Adams, MA 02147.