Gundel Brockhaus

1930 - 2022

Gundel Brockhaus
May 29, 1930 - December 15, 2022
Bellingham, Washington - Gundel was born Adelgunde A. Jansen in Uslar, Germany, as the third child of the Baptist preacher Johannes Jansen and his wife Minna (nee Dingel). She attended elementary school (four years) and high school (six years) in various cities. The profession of her dad and the turmoil of WWII were the reason for many relocations.
1947 she started to work in Koblenz on the Rhine as a bookkeeper for the British occupation forces. She later found work as a nurse at Baptist Children's Hospital Tabea in Hamburg. It was also here that she publicly professed in baptism her faith in Jesus Christ as being her Savior. This faith never left her, was a secure foundation in her raising a family, and a firm hope for the future in eternity.
Gundel always had a desire to travel. She found a supervisory position at the well-known Clarendon Schools for Girls in Abergele, North Wales. Here she also continued her own education. From there she went to London as a nanny. Then she decided to emigrate to Canada, to Vancouver, B.C. The "Arosa Star" arrived in Montreal early November 1955. It took five days per train, to get from Montreal to Vancouver. Someone was to pick her up but had mixed up the day of her arrival. Gundel took a cab. She arrived at her destination penniless after the cab driver had reduced the fare to what she had on her!
She soon worked as a medical librarian at the General Hospital. She enrolled at the University of British Columbia in fall 1958. It was then, when Gundel met Henrich Brockhaus, her future husband, at Emanuel Baptist Church. It turned out that they both had been working in London at the same time, had come over on the same boat, had been on the same train and had not met! To financially support Henrich, also a student at UBC, she went back to work as a medical librarian. They married in 1960. Sons Walter, Andreas and Martin were born 1961, 1962 and 1964. The family moved to Seattle in 1963, so that Henrich could finish the coursework for his Ph.D. He began his career as an assistant professor in German language and literature at Western, Western Washington State College, now WWU in Bellingham in the fall of 1965. She was the reason that the young family started their life in Bellingham without any college debt.
All her life, Gundel was interested in children. As a young girl of 15, she took care of her four siblings while her parents were away trying to rebuild the war-torn Baptist church in Wuppertal-Barmen. She worked with children in Hamburg at the children's hospital Tabea. Her responsibilities for children continued at the Clarendon School in North Wales! Two daughters of Haile Selassie, then Emperor of Ethiopia, were among her charges. At Emanuel Baptist Church in Vancouver, she led the junior high group. Then there were her own three boys and three adopted children, Heidi, Bonnie and Jason. During many years, the Brockhaus abode became a foster home to other children, who needed a lot of love, as well as a day home for children of working mothers. Gundel was a mother to many! For a few years she was a teacher at the Bellingham German school. The Coalition Against Child Abuse was another area in which she was quite active.
In her personal relationship with others, Gundel always acted and reacted on the spiritual foundation of her faith without neglecting the need for common sense assessment. She was a critic of hypocrisy, but as soon as she saw a genuine need, she was a very attentive listener, ready to respond with good advice or helpful action. Gundel was a voracious reader all her life. She was especially interested in biographies and challenging theological writings. She is fondly remembered by, her children, grandchildren, relatives and the occasional guest, for her amazing Hazelnut and Mokka "Torten", addictive top-heavy "Streuselkuchen", juicy yeast plum cake slices with whipped cream, black-pot roast magic and much more.
Someone who knew Gundel well characterized her this way: "She was one of the gentlest, sweetest and kindest persons I have known."
A Celebration of Life will be at Christ the King (Meridian/Bakerview) on Tuesday the 15th of this month at 1PM. Reception afterwards.