1926-2026
Anna Fangor died peacefully 65 days before her 100th birthday at the Royal Victoria Hospital with her children by her side. Fiercely independent she stayed in her home until 12 hours before her passing.
She is survived by her daughter Alexandra, son Victor (Lara) and her two grandchildren Gabrielle (Michael) and Alyssa (Olivier). She was predeceased by her husband Wojciech and brothers Ambrose and Daniel Stubnya.
She was born the middle of three children in Munkacs, Hungary and educated by the Sacred Heart nuns until the outbreak of WWII. At 13 she was taken by a family friend to be hidden in the mountains for the war.
Eventually she ended up in Germany studying chemistry at the University of Munich. To support herself she worked for the International Red Cross in Family Reunification and tracing of displaced persons. With Hungary under Russian occupation, she decided to immigrate to Canada where she was accepted into a government program recruiting university educated women. She arrived in Quebec City on the ship The Samaria in October 1949 and then traveled to Montreal by train, during which time she saw the Northern Lights for the first time.
After completing her one-year commitment to the government, she started her career in banking with the Royal Bank of Canada. In the spring of 1950, she met her future husband Wojciech Fangor, an aeronautical engineer originally from Poland. They were married on Dec 24th 1950, because they both wanted a skiing honeymoon. The marriage lasted a happy 29 years until the sudden death of Wojciech in1980.
Continuing to work in banking, she eventually retired in 1987 from the Toronto Dominion Bank. In pursuit of her love of art and history, she started to volunteer as a guide at Chateau Ramezay where she remained for two years and became co-president of the Guides Association. In 1989 she began studying art at Concordia University and became a docent at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA). She guided tours at the MMFA for 31 years and was awarded the Diamond Key Award after having done over 1,500 tours. She stopped guiding due to the Covid pandemic, doing her final tour in February 2020.
She was very active in fundraising for the Museum; developing and running travel tours around the world. Her first tour was to Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia in 1991. When asked why she chose these countries, her response was that she wanted to introduce people to her country of birth, Hungary, which is often overlooked due to its small size. She organized and guided trips for more than 10 years with tours to Syria, Jordan, Turkey, Las Vegas, Germany, Boston, Greece, Newport Rhode Island, San Francisco, Cooperstown, Malta, Sicily and many other destinations. She was often approached by former trip participants asking about the timing and destination of her next trip. She was Co-President of the MMFA Volunteer Committee for Travel.
In addition to international trips, she organized many local day-trips for Museum guides in Montreal and surroundings over some 25 years. Through her network of contacts in the art world, she often managed to get access to special, private and unusual art collections. She took the guides to Cirque de Soleil, which has a collection of circus related artifacts going back to the 18th century; Eric Klinkhoff of the Walter Klinkhoff Gallery welcomed the guides on a regular basis; there was a visit to the McGill Rare Books Collection, the stunning Desmarais art collection, the exceptional Power Corporation collection, the Claridge collection of modern and contemporary art. She organized a tour with the grandson of Guido Nincheri to see the magnificent stained-glass work of the architect at the church of Saint Leon and the Chateau Dufresne, a majestic Beaux-Arts style mansion in Montreal.
Anna often said that her most important accomplishment in life was the raising of her two children Alexandra and Victor. She was thrilled when she became a grandmother with Gabrielle and Alyssa’s arrival.
Anna was a fantastic cook, baker and hostess and had many memorable and often noisy dinner parties in her home. She was more than willing to share her recipes, however, she often tweaked ingredients as she went that only she knew, so no matter how faithfully you followed the recipe it never tasted quite as good as hers. She loved gardening, which was shown by her extensive flower gardens with roses, primroses, tiger lilies, begonias and many other plants at home and the cottage in the Laurentians. She enjoyed river and ocean cruises and travelling with her daughter to various parts of the world. During and after Covid she focused on her flowers and indulged in her love of books.
Many thanks to Dr. J. Pickering and Nurse Clinician D. Xenos (both at Internal Medicine) and Dr. M. Sami (Cardiology), all at the RVH/Glen for their compassionate care and treatment of Anna over the years. Special thanks to S. Canares for her help during the past year, but especially during the last week of Anna’s life.
Visitation will be held on Thursday Jan 22nd from 4 to 8 pm at J. J. Cardinal Funeral Home, 2125 rue Notre-Dame, Lachine, H8S 2G5. A service will be held at J.J. Cardinal Funeral Chapel on Friday Jan 23rd at 11 am. Burial will be on Monday, Jan 26th at 11:30 am at the National Field of Honor Cemetery (The Last Post) on 703 ave. Donegani, Pointe Claire, Quebec . Online condolences can be expressed at: jjcardinal.ca
As she loved flowers feel free to send flowers or bring a flower to place by the casket. If you wish to make a donation, please consider the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
RÉSIDENCE FUNÉRAIRE J.J. CARDINAL FUNERAL HOME
2125, rue Notre-Dame, Lachine (Québec) H8S 2G5
Tél. : 514-639-1511 | Téléc. : 514-639-1516 | Courriel : service@jjcardinal.ca
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