Cora Beatrice Mosher
Services have been scheduled for Cora Beatrice Mosher, a longtime Alaskan who celebrated her 101st birthday at the Pioneers Home on Nov. 9.
A memorial service will be 3 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 16, at the Pioneers Home Chapel. A service will be scheduled later in Ketchikan, her former hometown.
Cora was born in Astoria, Oregon, on Nov. 9, 1917, one of eight children of Nels and Amalie (Smerratt) Ludwigsen, who had immigrated to the United States in 1914 from the Isle of Sylt in the North Sea, off the coast of Germany. They had married in Astoria on Sept. 6, 1914.
The family moved from Astoria to Seattle when Cora was a child, and she graduated from Queen Anne High School. In May 1938, the family moved to Ketchikan aboard the family’s 36-foot troller, Amalie L, built by Cora’s father, a boat builder.
Cora met her husband, Floyd Mosher, in Ketchikan and they were married there on May 2, 1940. Cora and Floyd enjoyed taking car or train trips back to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan where Floyd had family.
Floyd was a machinist for Alaska Air Lines then worked at the Ketchikan Pulp Mill. Cora worked at Tongass Trading Company and at the Ketchikan Post Office.
Cora was a proficient knitter – most family members have at least one of her beautiful afghans. She enjoyed reading and listening to her favorite music, and she especially liked walking – in Ketchikan she and Floyd walked at least once, if not twice, a day around Ward Lake.
Cora and Floyd moved to Sitka around 2006 when Floyd entered the Sitka Pioneers Home. Cora lived across the street from the home above Harry Race Pharmacy and visited Floyd on a regular basis until he passed away, in 2009.
Cora joined the Sitka Pioneers Home family on Jan. 17, 2018, and celebrated her 101st birthday there. She took part in many of the activities in the home, and her family visited with her regularly.
Cora continued her love of walking here, and spent a lot of her time on daily strolls around downtown Sitka – she had a favorite spot at Totem Square where she fed the ravens every day.
Cora will be missed by her family, friends, the staff at the Sitka Pioneers Home, and her beloved ravens.
Cora was preceded in death by six of her seven siblings; husband Floyd; son-in-law Everett Webb; and grandson Michael (Jocelyn) Webb.
She is survived by her daughter, Janice Webb, and her son and daughter-in-law, Ron and Bitsy Mosher, all of Sitka.
Her grandchildren, Curtis (Lynn) Webb of Folsom, California, Jocelyn (Mike) Webb of Sitka, Trevor (Barbara) Webb of Sitka, Jolene Mosher of Ketchikan, Amelia Mosher of Sitka, and Nick (Teresa) Mosher of Milton, Washington; ten great-grandchildren; many nieces and nephews; and her brother, Herman Ludwigsen of Ketchikan, also survive.
