Ann Tannreuther, of Waterloo, loved teaching children. As a Head Start and preschool instructor for almost her entire career, being a good teacher was very important to her.
“Even in the summertime she would be gathering things, making lesson plans and learning new techniques for working with kids,” says her cousin, Soo Greiman of Hudson.
Greiman says she and Tannreuther were first cousins and a year apart in age.
“We grew up together, then went to different colleges, but when I moved back home, she was there, and we were best friends for 40 years.”
Tannreuther lived on a heritage farm in Orange Township that has been in their family for more than 150 years.
“She was so proud of her deep roots and was always giving people copies of a book that she helped author about Orange Township,” Greiman says. “She was on the historical committee at the church and was always looking out for the community.”
Greiman says Tannreuther maintained relationships with many of her former students, especially those she taught in Head Start.
“She developed a real love and fondness for them, and they always kept in touch with ‘Miss Ann’ as they called her,” Greiman says. “They would tell her what they were doing in college and after they graduated from high school. She was ‘Miss Ann’ to a whole lot of kids in Waterloo.”
Greiman says she can’t recall a specific conversation but knows that she and Tannreuther had both agreed they would want to be eye, organ, and tissue donors if they could. After Tannreuther died on May 13, 2023, she says she received a call asking about donation.
“I had a nice conversation with a man who said they could recover her eyes, and we all just said, wonderful,” Greiman says. “She would be the first to say yes, if I can be of any use, please.”
Greiman says she received correspondence from two men who received Tannreuther’s corneas, and who discussed how their eyesight had been enhanced.
“We were all very moved,” Greiman says. “I read the letter to a group of girlfriends of Ann’s, and gosh, we all through our tears, we said that’s just what she would want.”