Obituaries

Anna Bobb passed away peacefully February 23, 2016 in the loving and caring home, Brookdale North Fremont in Fremont, California due to complications from Parkinson’s disease and dementia. Anna was preceded in death by her son, Dusan in 1993, husband, Imrich in 2002, and her sister Marie Spurkova in 2008 in Prague, Czech Republic. Anna was born August 11, 1924 in Sokol, Czechoslovakia. She is survived by her daughter, Alena Navarra, son-in-law, Charles Navarra, granddaughter, Veronika Marie Navarra, her niece Arnostka Vansova, and nephew by marriage, Jaroslov Vansa who live in Prague, Czech Republic, as well as their 2 sons, Martin and Jakub Vansa. During Anna’s 91-1/2 years of life, Anna resided in many different locations. At 14 years of age her family moved from Slovakia (formerly Czechoslovakia) to Prague, Czech Republic, due to political unrest in their country. Anna lived in Prague until she met her future husband, Imrich Bobb. They married on September 28, 1948 in Prague and then escaped in April 1949 due to the pending communist take-over in Czechoslovakia. Anna escaped her home country to Brussels, Belgium while her husband, Imrich escaped to Vienna, Austria under a false name (to protect his own life, because he was on the most-wanted list of the Russian/Communist party). Once they re-united in Brussels, Anna gave birth to their son, Dusan in August 1949. After waiting several months to see if the political situation would change in Czechoslovakia (and sadly it didn’t) in 1950 they decided to move to Canada; at that time the United States was not allowing any more people to immigrate to the U.S. (even though Imrich’s parents were already living in Ohio for several years, and Anna & her husband wanted to live in the U.S. also). Then finally in 1952 they were allowed to move into the U.S. (Cleveland, Ohio) and in September of 1953 their daughter, Alena was born. Anna and her family lived in Cleveland until August of 1961 when the family moved to La Crescenta, California because her husband was offered a job as an electrical/mechanical design engineer with Rocketdyne, a division of North American Aviation. Anna and her husband lived in La Crescenta until 1998 when they moved to Fremont, California to be closer to their only grandchild, Veronika and in 1999, they moved and lived in Newark, CA. Veronika learned quite a bit of the Czech language from knowing both her grandparents, and especially her grandmother. In Czech a grandmother is called “Babi” and that’s what Veronika always called her; “Babi” became her favorite name with the entire family, which was the name that “stuck” with Anna. To Anna’s delight, even some of the staff at Brookdale called her Babi too.

Visitation will be held on Monday, February 29th from 9-11am and a Chapel Service will begin at 11am at Fremont Chapel of the Roses, 1940 Peralta Blvd., Fremont, CA 94536. Burial will follow at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park in Colma, CA.