By:Jerry Burke
One hundred eight years later, only six weeks shy of her 109th birthday, the longtime Franklin Square resident died of congestive heart failure April 22 at the Garden Care Nursing Home.
Nelle Marple Snediker was born in Sherrard, W.Va., the first of Milton and Lydia Marple's four children. Her mother died young, leaving Nelle to care for her younger brothers, Elmer and Stanley, and her baby sister, Alta.
In 1917, Nelle married Raymond Snediker of Jamaica, Queens, and soon afterward moved to New York. The couple had four daughters, Rae-Nelle (Bornkessel), now living in Nebraska, Zona Virginia, who died as an infant, Audrey (Fitchett), of Franklin Square, and Janice (Kamm), of Elmont.
An accomplished organist at her church, Nelle was offered a chance to appear in silent films at the Astoria Studios but turned it down in favor of caring for her family. Instead, she wrote storylines for many early films and worked in a music store, playing sheet music for customers.
The Snediker family moved to Franklin Square in 1929, becoming a vital part of the community. They joined the Ascension Lutheran Church, where Raymond served as an usher and treasurer and Nelle joined the Ladies' Aid Society and the Women's Missionary Society.
Throughout her life, Nelle bore witness to many historical events. In the early morning of May 20, 1927, she watched Charles Lindbergh take off from the muddy runway of Roosevelt Field in the Spirit of St. Louis as he began his solo trans-Atlantic flight to Paris. "She was holding my little sister in one hand," recalled her daughter Audrey, "and waving to him with the other." Audrey also remembered how heart-broken her mother was a few years later, when Lindbergh's baby was kidnapped and murdered.
When war broke out in 1941, Nelle worked with the Red Cross, sewing pajamas and packing medical supplies for the soldiers overseas. Like many at the time, she dutifully kept up her Victory Garden while her husband served as the local blackout warden and plane spotter.
Her love for gardening continued after the war, and she cultivated a prize collection of African violets. Nelle also enjoyed sewing, quilting, needlework, reading the Bible and listening to the Saturday-afternoon Metropolitan Opera on the radio. But her first love always was her family.
Raymond worked in the Nassau County Courthouse in Mineola until his death in 1961, at age 72. Their three surviving daughters all eventually worked for the Franklin National Bank.
The Snedikers had three grandchildren, Darinda Kamm, Gretchen Pucciarelli and Heidi Trosper, as well as four great-grandchildren, Caroline, Paul and John Pucciarelli and Kaden Trosper.
Nelle enjoyed very good health most of her life. It wasn't until she was 104 that her family had to entrust her care to the Garden Care Center. She enjoyed daily visits from her family and her afternoon wheelchair stroll through the gardens, and was very popular with the staff. Ever the southern lady, she had great respect for her doctors and nurses, referring to all of them as "dear."
"She was such a simple, nice woman," said Audrey. "We never had much money, but she was so optimistic about tomorrow, no matter what happened. She would always say, 'With all its heartaches and problems, life was still pretty wonderful.'"
Her funeral was arranged by the Krauss Funeral Home. The Rev. Gregory J. Sutterlin conducted the service at the Ascension Lutheran Church on April 24. She was interred next to her husband of 44 years in Greenfield Cemetery in Hempstead.
