Juanita -Joni- Gold

Joni (Juanita) Nauman Gold, 96 of Cottonwood and formerly of Flagstaff, passed away on May 31, 2017. She was born in St. Anne, Illinois to John and Emma (Larsen) Pinsak and raised in Momence, IL. During WWII she enlisted in the Navy, a Yeoman 1st Class where she was one of the first women to replace men at the Fleet Post Office in San Francisco, CA. The job of these WAVE\u0027s was to reroute mail to Navy personnel as the ships moved from place to place. This is where she met and married Lt. Robert S. Nauman. When peace was declared, Joni says her "five minutes of fame" was, along with two other WAVE\u0027s, delivering the last of the mail to the first returning ship, the Saratoga, where they climbed a rope thrown overboard (known as Jacob\u0027s Ladder) and rode the ship under the Golden Gate Bridge into port. She was honored in April 2014 by WWII Veterans Honor Flight with a 3 day tour of the Memorials in Washington. After the Navy, she and her husband moved to Mound City, MO where they started a family and then to Chillicothe, MO before moving to Flagstaff, AZ where she remained until last year before moving to Cottonwood. She was Registrar for the Boy Scouts of America for 8 years, often going on hikes with the scouts. She later became Executive Secretary, Administrative Assistant, and Public Relations Director at the Flagstaff Hospital for 15 years. Upon retiring, she married W. Lawrence "Larry" Gold and enjoyed traveling to eleven different countries, hiking the Grand Canyon and Matterhorn in Switzerland, volunteering at the hospital gift shop, Food Center for 30 years and other places where needed. She was preceded in death by her parents, two sisters and a brother, by both her first and second husbands and one son, Bruce D. Nauman. She is survived by son Robert "Skip" Nauman (Jean) of Hawaii, a daughter Margo Centner of Arizona, eight grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. Special thanks and appreciation are given to nephew Ron (Gail) Starkey, niece Judy (Chuck) Collinsworth and to her late husband\u0027s nephew Larry (Sandy) Anderson for their devoted care in her remaining years. A memorial will be held at the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany, 423 N. Beaver Street in Flagstaff on Friday, June 30, 2017 at 1:00pm. In lieu of flowers, please make a donation to a charity of your choice in Joni\u0027s name. An online guestbook is available to sign at www.westcottfuneralhome.com