Lois (Gulbrandsen) Daly

Click to listen to the funeral service. Available until July 29, 2016.

Lois (Gulbrandsen) Daly, beloved Mother, Grandmother, and Great-grandmother, passed away on April 26, 2016, in Naperville, Illinois, where she had been lovingly cared for for six years by her daughter Gina Rosa, Gina’s husband Marty and their children.  

Lois Ione Stirling was born on January 25, 1924, in Salt Lake City, Utah, to Albert Young Stirling and Emily Dorcas (Kingsbury) Stirling.  In 1943, Lois married Norman R. Gulbrandsen in the Salt Lake Temple, and together they raised six children, living primarily in Provo, Utah and in Wilmette, Illinois.  In 1969, Lois married Robert L. Daly of Chicago, and their marriage was later solemnized in the Salt Lake Temple.

Lois taught her children to pray at an early age, and emphasized the importance of missions and temple marriage.  Her efforts were rewarded as her five sons and son-in-law served missions.  Her six children were sealed in LDS temples.

Lois had a wonderful, outgoing, and positive outlook on life.  Her laugh was contagious, even in her later years of illness.  Her capacity to love others was profound. Her children could do no wrong, as school principals learned if they tried to criticize any of her children.

Lois and her husband Norman were gifted singers, and delighted audiences in Provo with vocal duets.  Lois played the lead role in the musical productions of Carousel and the Merry Widow.  In Chicago, Lois joined the Montgomery Ward Company, where she founded and directed the Wendy Ward program, in which girls were taught modeling, beauty, and life values.  She also produced the International Teen Princess Pageant in Chicago.  She went on to have a career in the retail industry, including managing boutique shops in Chicago and Denver, and working as a buyer for ZCMI.

Lois is survived by her six children, Stephen (June), Douglas (Linda), Jim, Robert (Sarina), Richard (Karen), and Gina Rosa (Marty); by 29 grandchildren and 38 great-grandchildren.  She was preceded in death by her parents, her siblings Dorcas (Stirling) Seymour, Margaret (Stirling) Larsen, Albert Young Stirling; and by two grandsons, Ryan and Michael Gulbrandsen.

A funeral service will be held on Saturday, April 30, at 10:00 a.m. at the Bitner Ranch Ward, 3010 W. Saddleback Road, Jeremy Ranch, UT (take Jeremy Ranch exit of I-80). Friends and family are invited to visit 9:00-9:30 a.m. prior to the service. Interment will follow at the Salt Lake City Cemetery. Guestbook to post messages and tributes for the family is available at: www.HolbrookMortuary.com