Having grown up in Trenton during the Great Depression, Lorraine had a life-long appreciation for the simple things in life: love of family, nature, music, and words. She graduated Trenton High School in 1940 and became a legal secretary at a local firm, where she met her future husband, Theodore T. Tams, Jr. A law school student at the time, “Bud” was immediately smitten by the young lady behind the front desk.
Married in 1948, Lorraine and Bud raised six children, enjoyed ten grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. Lorraine immersed her children in beauty and nature, sitting us in her lap on the upstairs balcony to teach us constellations, always starting with the North Star to blaze paths through night skies.
Lorraine looked to nature to define beauty and heal illness, growing flowers for bouquets, harvesting berries for “Tams Jams,” and drying herbs for tonics. She collected cookbooks, read poems to us aloud, and wrote her own.
Lorraine earned her broker’s license and sold Princeton-area real estate for more than three decades. She held old friends close and charmed new ones at every pass. Her beautiful singing voice graced various choirs, including St. Paul Church and Rossmoor Chorus. Even as most other memories abandoned her, she always remembered how to be a hostess and the lyrics to favorite songs.
She loved her husband and children unconditionally, and nursed Bud through twenty-five years of a debilitating illness, later addressing her own degenerating health with pragmatism and grace. A loving wife, nurturing mother, adoring grandmother, and proud great-grandmother, Lorraine Tams died peacefully at her home, with her family there, at the age of 94.
Lorraine was predeceased by Theodore T. Tams, Jr. and daughter Ruth F. Tams. She is survived by her children, Simon (Daren) Tams, Georgia (Hugh) Tams, Colin (Deborah) Tams, Brian (Laurie) Tams and Daphne (Kent) Ireland; grandchildren Ingrid, Lilia, Andria, Christian, Caroline, Leah, Sean, Claire, Larissa, and Gavin; and great-grandchildren Nicolas and Noah.
Lorraine was a champion blood donor for the American Red Cross, and a member of Springdale Golf Club, Nassau Club, Garden Club, Present Day Club, Coldwell Banker Schlott, St. Paul’s Church, Herb Society of America, and Rossmoor Chorus.
On Monday, May 21, 2018, visitation 9:30am –10:30am at Kimble Funeral Home, Princeton, followed by a memorial mass at St. Paul Church, Princeton at 11:00am and burial at Princeton Cemetery.
Donations may be made to the American Cancer Society.
