Ann Marie Regier

ANNA MARIE REGIER, 87, longtime Grant resident, passed away January 29, 2026, at Covenant Village Rehabilitation & Care Center of Colorado in Westminster, Colorado.

Ann was born June 28, 1938, on her family farm in rural Marion, South Dakota to Peter P. and Edith I. (Wenger) Preheim. She graduated from Marion high school with the class of 1956. She received a nursing degree from Bethel Deaconess Hospital in 1959 and her Bachelor of Science 1961 from Bethel College in North Newton, KS.

It was at Bethel that Ann met and dated Ivan Regier. Then, on Thanksgiving Day in 1961, the couple were married. Shortly thereafter, they answered a call to serve as house parents for 12 missionary children with the Board of Missions for the General Conference Mennonite Church in Japan, just 15 years after the end of World War II. Following two years abroad, they returned to the United States and settled on the Regier family farm north of Madrid, Nebraska, where they lived for much of their married lives. Later, they built a retirement home in Grant, near the Westview Retirement Community where Ann moved following Ivan's death in 2023.

Throughout her life, Ann was dedicated to building bridges-between people, cultures, and community needs. Whether volunteering, educating, mentoring, managing, dreaming or ministering, she worked to make her community better.

For more than a decade Ann brought faraway Japanese culture and life practices to local schools and clubs through interactive presentations. She dedicated the use of her nursing degree to creating solutions to the challenges of aging in Perkins County and drawing others to this work. This included serving more than 20 years as director of nursing for the Golden Ours Convalescent Home, part of Perkins County Hospital, where she pioneered the integration of memory care and unique strategies for working with dementia patients.

In addition, Ann served on a number of regional and state boards dealing with health care for the elderly, helped launch her church's health committee, founded a local county home health agency, and established a fitness program (FROG) for those over 55.

Late in her career, Ann went to work as a consultant for Kolb & Associates, helping small rural communities build retirement facilities. This included one in her home community of Grant, NE, where the Westview Retirement Community was opened in 1993.

In June 2025, nearly two years after husband Ivan's death, Ann moved to Covenant Village Rehabilitation and Care Community in Westminster, Colorado, near where her youngest son Michael and grandson, Mateo, live.

She was preceded in death by parents, Peter P. and Edith Preheim; brothers Waldo, Delbert, Roland, Don and John; sisters Verna and Emma, and by her husband, Ivan Regier.

Survivors include her sons, Mark (Marlene Kroeker) Regier of Elkhart, Indiana, and Michael Regier of Denver, Colorado; one grandson, Mateo Regier; and her sister, Barb Carlson of Westminster, Colorado; and brother, Peter, of Marion, South Dakota.

Memorials are suggested to Bethel College, Kansas, or the Grant United Methodist Church. Condolences may be shared at bullocklongfuneralhome.com, where the services will be streamed live.

A Celebration of Life will be held May 1, 2026, at 10:00 a.m. at the Grant United Methodist Church, with Pastor Spenser Johnson officiating. Interment of cremated remains will be in the Madrid Cemetery.

Bullock-Long Funeral Home of Grant is in charge of arrangements.