Gertrude "Robbie" Dodson92 died Thursday, December 20, 2018 at Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital in Lebanon, NH.

Robbie was born on May 17, 1926 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. She grew up in Santa Barbara, California leading what she described as a golden childhood. Her beloved nurse, Christine Fletcher, nurtured her natural intelligence, competence, charm and resilient character. She loved school, often sitting in or near the front row, a habit at gatherings that she kept all her life. As a proctor at the Westlake School for Girls in Beverly Hills she reminded schoolmate Shirley Temple to wipe off what Robbie thought was lipstick, but which turned out to be the remnants of Shirley's movie makeup.

She graduated from Vassar College in 1947, majoring in English and honing her skills and aptitude for literature, poetry (her favorite was Robert Browning) and classical music (her favorite was Mozart). She was a people person with a natural affinity for meeting strangers. Her granddaughter, after taking a walk together on city streets, remarked "Gigi talks to everyone." The quickness and charm of her quips, usually related to someone's remarks, showed a warm spontaneity. She was very thoughtful of others, loving people for what they were, regardless of their background or status. She adored children.

Robbie was a world traveler, having moved her home twenty times due to her husband's career wanderings. At the age of 25, while seven months pregnant, she undertook with him a series of flights from Geneva to Kolkata, India in piston-powered aircraft via the USA, Alaska, Japan, Hong Kong, Bangkok, and Rangoon. Her first child, Harry was born in India, her second, Phil was born in Geneva and her fourth son, Christopher was born in Belgium. Her third son, Nicholas, born in the USA, is deceased.

She was smart, enterprising and capable. To help pay for a son's education she worked as a "temp," enduring a mixed bag of difficult bosses to finally find perfection when she became executive assistant to the president of the North American subsidiary of a major French multinational firm in Greenwich, Connecticut.

She is survived by her husband of 68 years, Robert H.T. Dodson, and by three of her four sons, Harry of Ashfield, Massachusetts; Philip of Aleu, France; and Christopher of Greenfield, Massachusetts. Her grandchildren include Abbott Dodson of Brooklyn, Eleanor Dodson of Ashfield and, in Europe, Noah Dodson of Brussels, Lena Dodson of Paris, Erwan Dodson of Mons, Belgium and Elsa Dodson of Liege, Belgium. A great granddaughter, Sonya Dodson lives with her mother in Ashfield.

A memorial service for Robbie will be held at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, February 16, 2019 at St. Thomas Episcopal Church, 9 West Wheelock Street, Hanover, NH. In lieu of flowers, donations to St. Thomas Church would be welcome.

On May 11, 2019, which would have been her 93rd birthday, she will be buried on a palm-strewn bluff cemetery overlooking the Pacific, following a service at All Saints-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Montecito, California.

Arrangements were under the direction of the Rand-Wilson Funeral Home of Hanover, NH.