Born July the 1st, 1939 in Amityville, NY to her late mother Anne Noble Adams and late father John Pershing Adams, she is forever in the hearts of her beloved grandchildren, Jean-Baptiste Pascal Riffaud age 17 and Isabelle Emily Riffaud age 14 as well as her beloved daughter Karine Bakhoum born in Geneva Switzerland on May 14th, 1963.
Joanna met her first husband Selim Fahim Bakhoum, when she was 19 years old at the very stylish Casino in Geneva Switzerland. They married in Cairo Egypt in the Coptic Church in Zamalek in 1959 and lived in Geneva until returning to NY and divorcing in 1968. She started a long and successful career in Real Estate which she subsequently shared with her late husband of 32 years, Eugene J Beneduce, owner and founder of Westhampton Realty in Westhampton Beach, NY. They retired and moved to Naples, Florida in a beautiful home with a view on a lake in a bird sanctuary that delighted her for hours as she peered through her mini binoculars. She leaves behind her very dear friends and close neighbors, Rosemarie Toennes and Michael Schorn.
Joanna was a champion swimmer at her high school and a talented ballerina with such great legs she was offered a spot with the NYC Rockettes but chose modeling in Paris instead. She had myriad talents including cooking stellar gourmet meals, painting, home decorating, and spoke fluent French and a bit of Arabic, which she picked up practically overnight. She was a rare beauty with "a face that could launch a thousand ships,” and she lived her life to the fullest, traveling the world making tons of friends along the way. She was always the life of the party, had a terrific sense of humor, exquisite taste and loved her beautiful Persian cats of which she had 4 over the course of three decades. She loved to eat all kinds of foods from around the world and adored Crabs in any form; every year for her birthday she had to have a big fat Lobster and Corn on the Cob with lots of butter.
She is very sorely missed but her memory and essence will live on joyfully as we celebrate her life and her loving memory everyday. An intimate celebration of life and scattering of her ashes will take place on Sunday, September 16th at 4pm at her residence at 536 Lake Louise Circle, 201B, Naples, Florida 34110. Any correspondence can be sent to her daughter at 18 Club Drive Southampton, N.Y. 11968 (646)-209-9009.
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