The Funeral Service will be Live streamed from Montlawn Funeral Home - Click Here

- Will be viewable and Active on 4/08/21 - 15 Minutes before the service at 2:00 pm and will be available to re-watch at any time.

Anne Croom Scholz passed away on March 23, 2021, at the age of 87, after a brief but courageous battle with cancer. She was a 63 year resident of Rancho Palos Verdes, California. She was a beloved wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother with many names: Mom, Gramma, Nanna, Granny Annie, Great Granny Annie and Miss Anne.

Anne was born in Raleigh, North Carolina, on October 2, 1933, the only child of Carl Bayard Croom and Dorothy Baker Croom. Some of her fondest memories of her young childhood were her summers spent on her relatives' farms...with no electricity! After graduation from Needham B. Broughton High School in 1951, she attended St Mary's College for two years. In 1953, Anne married her high school sweetheart, James L. Waters, Jr., who was serving in the United States Air Force, and began travelling the country to exciting locales like Columbus, Missippi, Big Springs, Texas, where her son, Alan, was born, and Sioux City, Iowa, where her daughter, Beth, was born. In 1957 they settled in California and moved to Palos Verdes in 1958. Anne became involved in all of her children's' activities volunteering with the PTA, Girl Scouts, Cub Scouts, many sports organizations, and with her church, the Neighborhood Church in Palos Verdes Estates, California.

Finding herself single in the early 1970's, Anne went back to college and, in 1974, earned a degree in Furnishings and Merchandising and embarked on a 20-year career as a talented interior designer for Ethan Allen Galleries. That year she also married the new love of her life, Frank Paul Scholz. Frank introduced her to so many new adventures…hiking and camping in the Sierras, white water rafting, and the ultimate, an African safari! They were married for 41 years, until his death in 2015.

After retirement, Anne had time to pursue her many interests including gardening, crafting, scouring flea markets, antique shops and shows, and eBay for her countless collections, and traveling to Raleigh to attend her high school reunions beginning with the 50 th ! She loved spending time with her friends and family especially those grandchildren who she adored. She also loved Southern cooking, ice cream, all things chocolate, and those four feral cats she rescued as kittens nine years ago. She was a devout woman of faith and was extremely patriotic.

Anne was passionate about her genealogy and was proud of the many patriots she had discovered in her heritage. She is a member of several lineage societies including Daughters of the American Revolution, US Daughters of 1812 and the United Daughters of the Confederacy. One of her proudest moments concerning her ancestry was when she was accepted into the Order of First Families of North Carolina.

Anne was preceded in death by her parents and her husband, Frank, and leaves behind her two children, James Alan Waters (Yvonne) and Anne Elizabeth Gessner (Thomas), stepchildren Paul Scholz (Sandra) and Kristen Cumby (Robert), eight grandchildren Taylor Waters, Ryan Waters, Emily Gessner, Melissa Tierney (Daniel), Lauren Sterbens (Brett), Kevin Scholz (Lea), Walker Cumby, and Madison Cumby, and three (soon to be four) great-grandchildren.

Although Anne lived in California for 64 years, she has always been a true Southern lady and her heart has always been in North Carolina. She will be laid to rest in Raleigh, North Carolina, at Montlawn Memorial Park. Services will be held on Thursday, April 8, 2021, at 2:00 pm Eastern time. In lieu of flowers please consider a donation to the charity of your choosing.

A special thank you to everyone at Torrance Memorial Medical Center for the compassionate care they gave my mom. She will be missed more than words can say.