Ina was a Ann Arbor fixture for more than half a century, raising a family in Burns Park, completing her education at the University of Michigan, and educating junior high and high school students at Tappan, Scarlett and Pioneer over a 20-year teaching career. She was active in many book clubs and breakfast groups, and could often be spotted jogging, walking, or biking around campus or in the Arboretum. She was an active member of the UM Law School community, particularly when her husband, Terry, became Dean in 1978. For the past 20 years, Ina was a docent at the UM Museum of Art, where she shared her passion for art with countless visitors and busloads of children.
Born Ina Faye Davis in Chicago on May 18, 1936, Ina lead a life she never dreamed of while growing up. At age 19, she married Terrance Sandalow, whom she met on the beaches of Lake Michigan. The couple moved from Chicago to Vermont, Washington, D.C. and Minneapolis before settling in Ann Arbor in 1966 when her husband joined the UM Law faculty. While her kids were in school, Ina finished the undergraduate degree she began years earlier at the University of Chicago, earning both a bachelor’s degree and a Master’s of Education from the University of Michigan.
Ina had many passions. Her devotion to art led her to museums from Detroit to Abu Dhabi. Her love of nature spurred hikes from Yosemite to New Zealand. Though she didn’t travel abroad until she was in her 30s, by the time she was in her 70s she and her husband had visited every continent and nearly 50 countries. Photographs of nature and wildlife she took during her travels line her Ann Abor home.
Ina was always in motion. Earlier this year, at age 83, she traveled to the UAE with her oldest son David so she could see the Louvre Abu Dhabi. Returning solo to Michigan, she scheduled an 8-hour layover in Amsterdam so she could visit the Rikjsmuseum. A year earlier she had met up with her granddaughter and cousins in Jordan so she could see Petra. She took annual hiking trips with her daughter, Judith, and visited the Soviet Union with her son, Marc.
She had an enormous network of friends, whom she met with regularly over meals and walks. She participated in the Dexter-to-Ann Arbor 10K more than a dozen times and continued to walk or work out with a trainer regularly. She was also an avid reader, a life-long habit that played an important role in her early romance with Terry.
Her biggest passion was her family. Her three children all settled in Washington, D.C., where she had given birth to her middle son, and where she had taken hundreds of high school children on field trips. She and Terry spent at least a month each year in Washington, becoming a regular part of their grandchildren’s lives. Ina’s final day was typical of her retirement: A workout with her trainer, lunch with Terry, and a Zoom meeting with her book club.
Ina is survived by Terry, her husband of 65 years, her children, David, Marc and Judith, daughters-in-law Holly and Marcie, grandchildren Ben, Maya, Holly, Casey, Malcolm, Antonio and Phillip, and many great-grandchildren. There is no service scheduled at this time. The family asks that donations be sent to the Children's Law Center (www.childrenslawcenter.org.)
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