Ann M. Weiss

Ann Marie Weiss died in her sleep Friday, June 1, 2018 after a full, rich life. She was 95 years old. Born Ann Young in St. Louis on Feb 9, 1923, she grew up in the Shaw neighborhood as daughter of Beatrice Swantner and H. Milton Young.

She graduated in 1944 from what was then Webster College, a small Catholic school for women, where she studied drama and starred in a number of plays. In 1946, she married the late Raymond G. Weiss, an accountant. She gave birth to two boys and adopted two more boys and a girl through Catholic Charities and the Weiss family made a home in St. Louis Hills.

Despite the growing family, she was also active outside the home in neighborhood politics and at her alma mater. She was president of the Webster College Alumni Association in the late 1960s, a tumultuous time in higher education. Webster College, deeply in debt, was turned over by Sister Jacqueline Grennan to a secular board. Grennan stepped down as president and, on Jan. 1, 1970, Leigh Gerdine took over. “A lot of the women were talking about setting up their own alumni association,” Mrs. Weiss said in a 1989 story in the Post-Dispatch. Gerdine gave credit to Weiss for “bearing the brunt of it all.” Eventually, most of the dissident members of the alumni association returned. “We weathered the storm,” she recalled.

In the early 1970s, Mrs. Weiss served on the Missouri Commission on Higher Education, a previously all male body that held sway over the budgets of state colleges and universities. Her appointment lasted four years. She came home and said to her husband, “Raymond, I can’t be a housewife anymore.” She went to work at the new Nieman Marcus store in Frontenac as a fashion coordinator from 1974 to 1988, when she retired.

A devout Catholic, in her later years she served as a lay reader in her parish, and helped care for babies born to drug-addicted mothers at the Queen of Peace Center. An avid reader, she subscribed to the New York Times Book Review to get a head start on reserving new books at the Library.

Ann Weiss was a loving mother to John, Roseann (Harper), Matthew, and Andrew (Diane) Weiss and the late Mark (Kathleen) Weiss. She was grandmother to Andrew, Jonathan, and R.J. Weiss. She is also remembered by her brother Jack (Carol) Young and many nieces and nephews.

Visitation is Wednesday, June 6 from 4 to 8 pm at Hoffmeister Colonial, 6464 Chippewa Street. Interment services begin Thursday, June 7 at 11 am at Hoffmeister.

In lieu of flowers, Mrs. Weiss requested donations be made in her memory to the Webster University Alumni Association.