JOAN ANN SCHMIDT

1947 - 2022

SCHMIDT, JOAN ANN (nee YATES) April 24, 1947 - December 11, 2022 Wife, mother, teacher. Joan Ann Yates, born in 1947 in Newcastle-Under-Lyme, England, immigrated with her family at age nine to Scarborough. Joan was a studious youngster, and after high school she attended St. Michael's College at University of Toronto. There she met lifelong friends, obtained a literature degree and worked the switchboard at Loretto College, where she met the love of her life, Ted Schmidt. After Ted and Joan married in 1969, Joan studied to become a teacher, eventually specializing in early childhood education. Joan taught first at St. Paul's School and in spare hours copy edited the Catholic New Times newspaper, then housed on the school's third floor. From the early '80s, Joan taught at St. John's School. After her 2013 retirement, she rejoiced in being a grandmother and bumping into former students and their families in and around the Birchcliff Village neighbourhood in Scarborough, where she and Ted lived for almost 50 years. Joan engaged the world and solved problems with an ethos of detail-oriented inquisitiveness, determination and humour handed down by her late mother, Joyce Tunstall. She will be missed by many who celebrated life with her and relied on her open door and heart over many decades, including her husband, Ted; daughters, Eileen Mitchell (Reid), Susannah Schmidt (Ryan) and Christiane Schmidt; grandchildren, John, Doug and Molly Mitchell, and Joe and Hugh Schmidt-George; siblings, Bob Yates (Betty), the late Sandra Kruse, Jill Woodman (Mike); brothers and sisters-in-law, Don Schmidt (Carol), Larry Schmidt (Brigitte), Philip Schmidt, and Paul Schmidt (Sherry); and many beloved nieces and nephews. Joan's death was like her beautiful life, grace-filled until the end as she was sacramentally embraced by all five grandchildren; each last supper fed by her daughters was eucharistic, given and received with thanks. Joan's family extends gratitude to and for medical professionals and the palliative care team at Michael Garron Hospital, especially second-floor nurses, who accompanied Joan and family with dignified and holistic care. In lieu of flowers, please send letters to your MPP and the Ontario government advocating raising nurses' wages and demanding adequate investment in public health care. Wake will be held Monday, December 19, 2022, at McDougall & Brown Funeral Home, 2900 Kingston Rd., Scarborough, 5 - 9 p.m. Funeral Mass followed by a reception on Tuesday, December 20, 2022, at 11 a.m. at St. John's Catholic Church, 794 Kingston Rd., Toronto.