Inge L. Hespeler

On Saturday January 14th, Inge Louise Hespeler, loving mother of two, passed away at the age of 99. An avid traveler, reader and history enthusiast, Inge was born on January 6th, 1924 in Berlin, Germany. She grew up in Leipzig, Germany with her sister Rita Knobloch and brother Peter Knobloch, both younger than her. She survived living in Germany throughout WWII, and assisted her family in evading the Russian invasion of Eastern Germany, where they ended up settling in Bonn, Germany.

In 1954, she boarded a ship where she met her husband Gebhard Hespeler while immigrating to Toronto, Canada, only to move to San Francisco several years later. In 1962, the couple moved to Norwood, NJ with Martin, their oldest child in tow, and where Corinna was born later that year.

In Norwood, she started to work for Butler and Smith, a BMW motorcycle importer, where she was the bookkeeper importing the motorcycles from Germany and later worked for BMW North America Motorcycle division.

No challenge too small for her, she began skiing at the age of 50 with her children, and after retirement traveled to 52 countries where she studied the language, culture and history prior to exploring the country and its people.

Inge is survived by her brother Peter, her son Martin and his wife Rosemarie with their three children Cory, Travis and Shannin and great grandchild Clementine, and daughter Corinna and her husband Robert, with their child Sydney.