Alice M. (Brandt) Gould

Alice M. (Brandt) Gould, age 95 of Asbury, Iowa completed her earthly journey on September 23, 2019 at Luther Manor Grand Meadows.  To celebrate Alice’s life, a private family service will be held at the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Illinois.

 

Alice was born on October 12, 1923 in Garnavillo, Iowa, a daughter to Louis H. and Amanda H. (Matt) Brandt.  She grew up in a loving Christian home and made a personal decision to accept Christ as her personal Saviour on November 23, 1933.  She would go on to marry the love of her life, Douglas Gould, on Christmas Eve, 1945.  Their union would be blessed with 3 daughters and they touched countless lives around the world before Doug was called home in 2005.  Alice was a devoted wife and mother who put the Lord first and demonstrated it with faithful love and care for her family and others in the world around her by sharing God’s salt and light. She truly enjoyed working with children, teenagers, and adults.  To enjoy God’s creation, Alice always enjoyed long walks and boat rides. She also invested in others through hospitality, grading Emmaus correspondence courses, and teaching children and women’s Bible studies.  Alice was an avid reader, composed poetry of her own, and at 80 was corresponding with over 250 people.  Our hearts daily experience both gratitude and sorrow as we remember she arrived joyfully into her new eternal home.  We thank the Lord for all of the love, beauty and joy she spread so generously throughout her 95 years among us. We rejoice she found perfect peace and joy in the Lord.

 

Those left behind to cherish the memory of Alice include,

 

her 3 adored children,

Lorna (William Charles, DC) Hollensed, Dubuque, Iowa,

Linda (Professor Craighton) Gould Hippenhammer, MD, Culver, Indiana,

and Louise (Commander Brent L., US Navy Ret.) Gould Boston, Winfield, Illinois;

 

her 6 grandchildren,

Sarah (Roger) Hollensed Poling,

Alice (Randy) Hollensed Palmer,

Darci (Craig) Hippenhammer Harland PHD,

Sonda (Joel) Hippenhammer Hansen,

Christina (Eric) Boston Smith,

and Alexandra Boston;

 

her 15 great-grandchildren;

 

her sister,

Helene (Grant) Zedicher, Andover, Minnesota;

 

along with numerous nieces, nephews, extended family, friends and neighbors.

 

Alice was preceded in death by her parents; her husband, Douglas William Gould; and her 3 brothers, Valmah, Robert, and Lloyd Brandt. 

 

Alice always had a heart for the lost and for International missions. Rather than honor her with flowers, Alice would be very pleased for the gifts to be long term investment in Emmaus International. The gifts will be used for translating Bible courses for their mobile app which is reaching people with the Gospel and Bible study tools in over 175 countries in its first 2 years of operation. This new phase of the ministry is based on the 77 year success of Emmaus Correspondence School in 110+ countries. Gifts can be directed to Emmaus International, P.O. Box 1028, Dubuque, IA 52004-1028 or https://emmausinternational.salsalabs.org/project24donate

 

Alice’s family would like to thank her doctors, along with the nurses and staff at Luther Manor Grand Meadows for all of their wonderful care and support and Tri-State Cremation Center for their compassion and service.

 

Online condolences may be shared with Alice’s family at ​www.tristatecremationcenter.com

 

To celebrate Alice’s life, a private family service will be held at the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Illinois.

7 comments on “Alice M. (Brandt) Gould
  1. Darci says:

    Grandma Gould,

    I am so proud to part of your legacy.

    My memories of you span a wide range, but have common themes. My childhood memories are all associated with you at the Kentucky Lake home. We would spend weeks at a time in a variety of activities including baking cookies, interacting with Bible flannelgraph pieces, learning to sew, swimming, and boating. Your influence was always quiet and steadfast. You modeled for me that to be influential, you don’t need to be charismatic, only genuine. I witnessed you walk meals to shut-ins. I saw you invite people from church to Sunday dinner and ask them engaging questions about their life, by-passing small talk in exchange for genuine and deep attentiveness.

    As a young adult, the memories are similar, only situated at Lake Max. Thank you for investing so wholly into both Craig and into me. We benefited from the profound spiritual, often theological, and always poignant conversations aimed to focus our attention on things that mattered for eternity, not just for the moment. While you and Grandpa modeled what a couple could accomplish together, you never claimed it a model to be copied. In your wisdom you knew that God uses people and couples in varying ways, and the key is to be open to what that would look like for us. Thank you!

    I will miss you terribly, but I will remember you as a women of integrity, a devoted prayer warrior, and the best grandma anyone could have ever asked for.

    Darci
    (granddaughter)

    • Aunt Lorna Hollensed says:

      Thank you for sharing, Darci. Grandma and Grandpa really enjoyed being part of your courtship, then marriage and family growth and travels! She loved to keep track of you, and especially loved to hear from you! We will all miss her and cherish different memories and lessons she taught us.

  2. Phil and Kristi Brandt says:

    Aunt Alice is finally where she longed to be. What a wonderful legacy she left behind. Over the years I was always impressed with the loving marriage Uncle Doug and Aunt Alice had. It was quite clear for all to see. I can remember visiting them and the girls in the apartment in Chicago. Uncle Doug helping Val and Robert to buy old lumber from houses being torn down for the new Chicago freeways to be used in Garnavillo Mill addition construction. And then visiting them at the their new apartment in the city, and also at the lake house in Kentucky. We enjoyed visiting her in the apartment in Dubuque and then her room in the home. She was a wonderful godly lady who will be missed, but as she is likely talking with Uncle Doug right about now, and he is likely asking her why she took so long to join him!! Phil and Kristi Brandt

    • Cousin Lorna Gould Hollensed says:

      Thank you for sharing, Phil. I never knew the stories of the men and the lumber for the mill.I remember your love of taking photos of the new expressways in Chicago. Every visit you made to Chicago always included a trip to Midway Airport to watch the air planes with you! Mom will be missed as she encouraged us to stay close to our relatives although they lived far away in Garnavillo! Thanks again.

  3. Marilyn J. Hoekstra says:

    *Alice was first my landlady–my parents & I lived in the 3rd floor apartment in Chicago in which Alice & Doug lived on the first floor and managed the building. I was 6. I loved Alice’s beautiful long honey-colored hair. She went to my church, too.
    * Alice next was my Sunday School teacher–a wise, patient teacher. We almost-teen girls listened carefully –most of the time–to her lessons, taught from her heart and from first-hand knowledge of the Scriptures and her Lord, whom she loved even more than her husband and children.
    *Alice then was a open-hearted hostess to our wild crowd of church teenagers. We gathered weekly in the Gould basement recreation area in Oak Lawn to sing, pray, and learn much-needed lessons. Often she accompanied our singing at the old pump organ in the basement. There was plenty of fun, too; and lots of home-made goodies to enjoy. While Alice was not our primary teacher, her Christian witness, conversation and interaction with each of us made lifelong, lasting impressions for our good.
    *Alice became a personal counselor to me when, at age 18, I became engaged to my now husband of 58 years, Grant. My newly widowed mother was distraught at my decision, wishing I would wait, finish college, and not marry until many more years had passed. With wisdom, patience, humor and God-directed advice–much directly from the Scriptures–Alice directed me to understand my mother’s concerns–mostly born from her newly widowed state. She also gave bits of much-needed sage advice about preparing my whole self—heart & soul– for my marriage–18 months in the future.
    *Alice and I awaited motherhood during the same time in late 1961 & early 1962. I, expecting my first child; Alice, expecting her third. We both had girls–and Kathy and Louise became friends, too! They first “met” each other when Kathy was just a few days old and Louise about 6-8 weeks. I recovered more quickly from childbirth and marveled at Alice’s recovery too–she 18 years older than I.
    *Alice mentored me in some housekeeping things–sewing, cooking for an unexpected crowd, managing schedule conflicts, and on a different level, preparing to teach a Sunday School class of pre-teen girls, and later, with Grant at Oak Lawn Bible Chapel, teen boys and girls in a first-ever gender-mixed class, held in some suspicion by the older church Elders.
    *Alice encouraged me to accept a friend’s challenge to me, to establish a women’s neighborhood Bible study. “Let’s do something first in my neighborhood; you can do some of the leading. Let’s pray about this and see what the Lord has in mind.” [Efforts were blessed by God; women came to know and love the Lord thru these studies.]
    *Alice came alongside me in moral, spiritual, and prayer support when a year later, I took my friend’s challenge and began leading a study in my own neighborhood. [Efforts were blessed by God; women came to know and love the Lord thru these studies.]
    *Alice counted me, my husband, and our children Kathy & Brian, as very often a Sunday dinner part of the Gould’s bountiful hospitality. Friends old and new, young and old, gathered regularly at Goulds’ house, Alice presiding quietly as hostess and conversation-starter. Everyone pitched in to help, either with a helping hand or with a covered dish. When there were no helping hands or dishes, Alice provided what we needed to complete the meal. (Remember, prepared for dinner for an unexpected crowd?) Sometimes, Doug would disappear for a half hour or so and return quietly with a grocery bag. Nothing was overlooked.
    *When Alice, Doug and Louise moved to Kentucky, we missed the close interaction, but our friendship didn’t lag. Cards, letters, and occasional visits kept us in touch. Alice never forgot my birthday, October 29; I still have the last card she sent me, just a few years ago, wishing me the Lord’s blessing in my new location in Colorado.
    *Alice truly has been a life-long friend of the heart, one with whom I’ve shared the full range of human emotions. We’ve laughed, cried, sorrowed, rejoiced, shared fears and hopes. When I visited her in July of 2018 in her final Iowa location, I realized that I had seen her through the decades in all the homes, large or smaller, many, or one-room, ‘regular’ address, or Lake Geneva or Lake Maxinkukee (sp?) vacation and interim addresses.
    *On that final in-person visit with Alice, I read John chapter 14 to her from her KJV Bible at her chair-side. She quoted from memory with me. I turned on the electronic keyboard in her room and we sang hymns together and also enjoyed “Jesus Loves Me” and “Thank You Lord, for Saving My Soul”. Earlier, before we went to her room, she was eating her supper in the dining room, sharing a table with 3 other residents. I watched, unseen by her, from a distance–not wanting to interrupt her meal with my unexpected presence. Finishing her dessert, she expressed concern about her table-mate, a man unable to manage his meal. Alice got an aide’s attention, asking the girl to assist him. This so warmed my heart. She was still “Alice” even though I hadn’t seen her for about 5 years. Our visit was about an hour. Done with the reading and singing, I prayed for her. then she prayed for me and my family. We wept & hugged. “I think you’ll be Home before I am!” I said as we parted. I let my tears flow freely in my car before I left the parking lot.
    *Alice was a dear friend, a friend to the end. Hers is a life well-lived. She honored her Lord and Savior in all her ways. A true Proverbs 31 woman, her Heavenly reward will be great. She will be remembered and missed by –dare I say–thousands who crossed her path. Her, children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and all the rest of her extended family surely know how blessed they are to have known, loved and been prayed for by my friend, Alice Brandt Gould.

    • Lorna Hollensed says:

      Thank you, Marilyn. I knew you were friends but not how deeply. We will all miss her but she was so ready for her heavenly home.

  4. Amanda Ferris, Great Niece says:

    My memories of Aunt Alice begin when my family took a vacation to visit Uncle Doug and Aunt Alice in the lake home in Murray, Kentucky. I was about 8 or 9 years old. I remember feeling so loved and cared for by them each in their own ways. There was the lavishly laid breakfast table with blue dishes in the morning. Then it was different at lunch and dinner. I didn’t see it as a way to show off her earthly possessions but as a way to show love and honor to us. It communicated to me that I was special and loved as she had taken the time to set a fancy table with delicious food.
    I remember receiving birthday cards from Aunt Alice, faithfully year after year. In each one she wrote some not of encouragement and how she was praying for me. I looked forward to these cards.
    I remember some conversations with her at the Garnavillo farm house when I was visiting one time, perhaps for a family reunion but I am not sure. I don’t remember the details of the conversation but I remember her gentle, quiet spirit, yet strong in her trust in God and his ways. She always had a word of encouragement from God’s word to share. It was evident that she read and memorized scripture truly hiding in her heart.
    It’s hard to think of Aunt Alice without Uncle Doug. I remember the smile and twinkle in her eyes when he was up to no good. Their love and care for one another was so evident and yet you could tell they had fun and enjoyed one another too. I didn’t get to witness it much first hand but heard of the faithfulness and love she displayed to Uncle Doug as she took care of him when he had ALS. Again, another example of her devotion to him. This is true love to serve another in their time of need with joy as she trusted in the Lord.
    I remember one of my more recent visits to her after I had moved to Budapest. She was living in a small apartment in Dubuque, Iowa. My parents and I went to visit her. At this point, her eyesight was getting poor. I was amazed at the magnifying machine she had so she could continue to read. She shared and talked about the Lord’s faithfulness and goodness to her in her life.

    Aunt Alice was a treasure to me, even as a grand niece, and an example of a godly women who humbled herself and put her trust in the Lord. She knew of his salvation, strength, goodness and faithfulness. She proclaimed it joyfully to others knowing it was their only hope. She wisely invested much time to reading God’s word. Yet, she also loved her family and served them well through the strength that God supplied her. I am grateful for her influence in my life and treasure these memories of her. I wish that I could be there today to remember and celebrate her life lived in honor of the King of Kings. I am grateful that she is now enjoying her reward of being with her Lord and Savior in his presence. Oh what a joy that must be!

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