Louise passed on September 4, 2023; weeks shy of her 98th birthday. Louise was born in Arvada, Colorado, the first of four children. She and her husband Lauron met in the Chemical Engineering department at the University of Colorado. After years in Washington, Oregon and Southern California they moved to Antioch, with Lauron working for Crown Zellerbach and Louise raising their three daughters, Leslie, Linda, and Lori.

Louise became a substitute teacher and in 1964 she was appointed to the Planning Commission, where she remained until she won a seat on the City Council in 1968. She became the first woman mayor of Antioch in 1970-1971, and again in 1975-1976, a groundbreaking role model for future generations of young women. In addition to the City Council, Louise served as Chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG). She was also appointed to the Seismic Safety Commission and was an independent contractor for environmental protection at Caltrans.

 In 1966 Louise obtained her pilot’s license and in 1969 she and Lauron flew the family in a six-seater Cherokee on a tour of the United States. After retirement they loved to travel and were proud of the fact, they had visited all seven continents. Later Louise and Lauron relocated to Sonora, California, where they resided for over 20 years. They loved exploring the Eastern Sierras and she was involved in the local arts community and became a prolific oil painter, often painting scenes of the Sierra foothills.

Louise was preceded in death by her husband of 62 years, Lauron, her sister Bobbie & brother-in-law Tom Warfield. Louise leaves behind daughters Leslie Lum, Ollie Linda Anderson & Lori Brown, her sister Billie Homberg & nephew David (Donna) O’Bryan and niece Donna Ruth (Todd) Schutz, brother Tony (Joie) Price, nephew Bill (Linda) Warfield, and niece Debra (Blue) Bergmann. She will be greatly missed.

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Louise Giersch

This entry was posted on Monday, November 6th, 2023 at 2:05 pm and is filed under City Council, Obituary. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.