Joy Ann Marie Baumeister Wachtell was born in Deloge, Missouri on 5/25/32 and departed for Paradise on 1/11/22. Her parents, Clara and Joseph Baumeister, owned and operated a German Bakery in Fulton Missouri for more than 30 years. When still in high school, she met her future husband, George, while working the cash register in that bakery. Fulton is the little town made famous by Winston Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech which Joy Ann witnessed live in 1946. The speech remains considered seminal in shaping World History after WWII. Her graduation speaker in 1952 at William Woods University in Fulton was Ronald Reagan, President of the Screen Actor’s Guild at the time. She went on to graduate from the University of Missouri with a degree in Home Economics in 1954. She settled and raised her children, Douglas, Karen, Patricia, Theodore, and Robert in Pleasantville, NY and passed in the same house she moved into in 1960. Her only paying job outside the home was as an occasional substitute teacher in the public school system that her children attended. She is predeceased by husband George (departed 6/16/16) and leaves a legacy of 5 children and 8 grandchildren. In her later years, Joy Ann was a friendly face often seen strolling around the villages of Pleasantville, Armonk, and Chappaqua, NY. She also enjoyed spending much time in Montauk, NY and Waitsfield, VT. At the family's request, please make donations, in lieu of flowers, to support dementia research at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center. To make an online gift, please go to https://medicine.givenow.columbia.edu/?alloc=23043# For those who want to make their gift by check, please make payable to the Trustees of Columbia University and indicate Noble Dementia Research Fund/IMO Joy Wachtell on the memo line. Mail the check to:

Columbia University Irving Medical Center
Office of Development
Attn: Matt Reals
516 West 168th Street, 3rd Floor
New York, NY 10032