Sally Brown Tange, 90, died peacefully of natural causes on Friday, May 6th at Highgate Senior Living in Bozeman, Montana.
Sally was born on August 2, 1931, in Wolverhampton, England where her father directed a Goodyear Tire factory. She is the daughter of Robert Toombs Brown and Mary Esther Doolittle.
At age 2, she moved to Akron, Ohio, where she attended and graduated from Buchtel High School in 1948 and Stephens College for Women in Columbia, Missouri in 1950. In September 1951, she married Henry Robinson, and together they had five children. Their marriage ended in divorce in 1967.
Now a single mother of five, Sally moved her children to Belle Mead, New Jersey, just outside of Princeton. To support her family, Sally held many jobs including being a phlebotomist at Princeton Hospital, commuting to New York City to work as a secretary at Cornell Medical School. She also started several small businesses, including an RV rental business that failed with the rising prices of gas in the 1970’s, and Sally’s Supper Service, a precooked meal delivery service that put dinner in your oven – perfect for commuters - shut down by local authorities due to food service regulations.
Sally loved to travel and wanted her children to see America – so she rented a motor home (today called an RV) and drove through 27 states during the summer of 1970 from NJ to CA and back. Each child was responsible for cooking one meal a week and had to write in a diary every day. Along the way, National Parks, family, friends and even Disneyland was visited.
In 1980, Sally married Henry Patton, Princeton Class of 1935. Together they traveled extensively in Europe, and she became fascinated by French food. After this marriage ended in 1987, she went to cooking school at La Varenne in Paris. Then at age 57, she worked for a year at L’Esperance in Vezelay, Burgundy, the only woman in a Michelin 3-star kitchen. Returning to New Jersey, she went to work as a secretary in the Department of East Asian Studies at Princeton University until her retirement in 1993.
Sally then moved to Bozeman and took a part-time job at the Hampton Inn as the shuttle bus driver and breakfast server. She served coffee refills in her silver coffee pot. At the time of her move, four of her five children lived in Bozeman as well. In 2006, she married Carl Tange, a longtime resident and local hotel developer of Bozeman. Together they traveled the world, including an around the world cruise on the Queen Elizabeth II in 2015.
In addition to gourmet cooking and travel, Sally was passionate about her dogs, gardening her daffodils in Princeton and Bozeman, loved to write, paint, and sculpt. She was an active member of the writer’s group at the Bozeman Senior Center, an active member of the Pilgrim Congregational Church in Bozeman, and a supporter of the Bozeman Symphony.
Sally is preceded in death by her parents; her husband, Carl Tange; one son, Robert Henry Robinson; and her sister, Mary Brown Kiernan. She is survived by sister, Pat Zeigler of Akron, Ohio; her children, James William (Ellie Lambrecht) Robinson, Thomas Brown Robinson, and Sally Hamlen Robinson, all of Bozeman, and Anne Elizabeth (Andrew Hamilton) Robinson of Greensboro, North Carolina; and her sole grandchild, Catherine “Catie” (Bryson Scheck) Robinson-Scheck of Belgrade, MT.
A Celebration of Sally’s life will be held later this summer and formal details will be announced. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that charitable donations be made to Family Promise of Gallatin Valley, PO Box 475, Bozeman, MT 59771.
Arrangements are in the care of Dokken-Nelson Funeral Service. www.dokkennelson.com [dokkennelson.com]
