Carolyn Wendy Newcomer

1949 - 2022

Carolyn Wendy Newcomer
June 27, 2022
Mission Woods, Kansas - Carolyn Wendy Pfeil Newcomer
Wendy Newcomer died unexpectedly on June 27 due to complications from a previous illness.
Wendy was born in San Antonio, Texas in 1949 and soon after moved with her family to Phoenix, Arizona, where she spent her childhood. Wendy developed her lifelong love for swimming and tennis at the Phoenix Country Club and at the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club near her family's vacation home in La Jolla, California. She also developed her passion for design and fashion and served on the Saks Fifth Avenue Teen Advisory Board. She attended Central High School in Phoenix and Orme Ranch School before heading for the University of Arizona, where she was a member of the Gamma Phi Beta sorority and the university pom-pon squad. After college, Wendy took a job in New York for Saks Fifth Avenue.
In Spring 1970, Wendy left New York to marry Pete Newcomer, whom she had met at the University of Arizona, and the two settled in Pete's hometown of Kansas City. Wendy embraced her new Midwest home where she continued her work in retail at Trapp and Company, then as managing partner at Pierre Deux, before joining Paul Hamilton in residential real estate. Wendy was a member of the Junior League of Kansas City and a served on the board of Planned Parenthood.
Twenty years ago, Wendy and Pete refurbished her family home in La Jolla and have since divided their time between the beach and Kansas City, building and maintaining great friendships in both communities, where they enjoyed golf and tennis at Mission Hills Country Club, La Jolla Country Club, and La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club.
Throughout her life Wendy enjoyed travel, the arts, design, and history, but her true calling was bringing cheer to those in need of a lift. Wendy was forever dropping carefully curated packages on the doorsteps of friends and acquaintancesâ€"each wildly imaginative, useful, thoughtful, soothing, and most oftenâ€"funny. Clips of cartoon strips tucked into fuzzy socks; chocolates tied to the latest bestseller book, a card usually signed on a sticky note, so it could be reused by the recipient. Wendy's generous spirit and raucous sense of humor brightened countless hours of those in her orbit. And unbeknownst to most in her life, her generosity extended to scores of individuals outside her circle, near strangers whom she helped anonymously, giving to individuals in need without wanting recognition. That generous spirit was a great legacy, even as Wendy faced difficult health challenges through the last years of her life.
Wendy is preceded in death by her parents, Edgar Thornton Pfeil, Virginia Pfeil and her brother, Ted Pfeil. She is survived by Pete, her husband of 52 years; brother-in-law Frank Chip Newcomer; sister-in-law Mary Bet Nigro Brown; cousins Bert Chip Ford, and Rick Ford; nieces Courtney Nelson and Kristin Nigro Weidman; nephews Trent Newcomer, Tommy Nigro and Andy Nigro, and her beloved god daughters, Kristin Weidman, Lyndsay Ruzicka, and Jessica James Criswell.
A celebration of life in Kansas City will be held on August 26 from 5-7 pm at Mission Hills Country Club. In lieu of flowers, the family requests contributions to Planned Parenthood or a charity of your choosing.