Ursula Dandurand

Ursula Dandurand of Boulder, Colorado, passed away peacefully on September 1, 2025, Labor Day. She was 89 years old.
Ursula lived a remarkable life, overcoming many challenges to achieve her goals and live with joy, love, and purpose. Relentlessly optimistic and tenacious, she was never prone to self-doubt or self-pity.
Born in Braunschweig, Germany, in 1936, in the midst of WWII Nazi Germany, young Ursula witnessed the horrors of the war.
Ursula was an extraordinarily beautiful young woman when she met Mahmoud Rouhol-Amin, an Iranian University student studying in Braunschweig. They married in 1956 and embarked on an epic road trip from Germany to Tehran in a Jeep – the trip lasting several months longer than planned and filled with harrowing adventures. Such was their life! Ursula embraced life in Tehran, quickly becoming fluent in Farsi, developing close relationships with Iranian friends and relatives, and appreciating all Persian history had to offer. In 1958, Ursula and Mahmoud had a daughter, Sussan.
Suffering from both some health challenges and cultural friction, Ursula and Sussan moved back to Germany to live with her family. Despite separating, Ursula and Mahmoud remained lifelong friends and even business partners until his death in 2022, and she stayed friends with Mahmoud's family for the remainder of her life.
In Germany, Ursula pursued an education and career in fashion design, working as a skirt designer in Frankfurt. There she met Ronald Dandurand, an American GI from Ohio. They married and upon Ron's discharge from the military, the couple moved to the US, soon settling in Perrysburg, Ohio. Ursula and Ron had a son, Andre Dandurand, born in 1968. Their marriage, however, was short-lived, and Ursula thereafter happily lived the rest of her life on her own terms as a single mother and woman.
Ursula's experience in fashion and retail led her to work as a buyer for Lamson's department store, and later as a manager for Hudson's department store. However, she discovered her real passion was medicine and nursing, and in 1975, while working full-time, she began her nursing studies at the University of Toledo. In 1980, she graduated with a BS in Nursing, the same year Sussan graduated from UT. The two could be seen at the family dining room table, with Ursula studying anatomy from flashcards held by Sussan.
Ursula found fulfillment in her work as a trauma nurse at the Medical College of Ohio but decided to follow Sussan and her husband John Gstalder to Boulder, Colorado, to keep the family close. In Colorado, she worked as a psychiatric nurse at the Denver VA hospital for many decades. She was fiercely protective of her "boys", as she referred to the veterans, and she advocated for them tirelessly. Pity the doctor who was hesitant in prescribing treatments she felt were needed by her boys.
In Colorado, she became the doting grandmother to Christine (Gstalder) Powell (1985), Daniel Amin Gstalder (1986), and Jacquelyn Xiaopei Gstalder (1996), lavishing them with love, attention, and food! In 2015, Christine and Aaron welcomed Cooper Alexander Powell to the world, and then Ursula had another 'Prince' to adore. Ursula enjoyed every minute with her grandchildren and great-grandchild, and they were all very close. When not working, painting watercolors, cooking gourmet dishes, gardening, sewing costumes and dresses for the kids, socializing with friends and family, hiking, or refurbishing furniture, Ursula could be found in casinos in Blackhawk or Las Vegas, feeding slot machines. She was hopelessly optimistic!
Ursula reveled in the successes and love of her beloved son, Andy, and her daughter, Susi. She was much-loved and will be missed. Rest in Peace sweet Mami, Mom, Grammy, Great-grandma, and Mother-in-Law.
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