Nancy Ann Swyers Sandgren

Nancy Ann (Swyers) Sandgren, 94, was born on November 23, 1930, in Belrose, NY, to parents William and Meta Swyers.  She was the sister to her adored younger brother Bill.  She married Harold Sandgren in 1953 and had three children, Jeff, Kathy, and David.  She went to meet our Lord on May 15, 2025, in Laurinburg, NC. Nancy – known as “Nana” to her many friends and extended family – was an extraordinary daughter, mother, grandmother, wife, neighbor, and friend.

Nancy met her future husband at Sewanhaka High School in New York.  After high school, she earned her Art Degree from the Art Students League of New York. When Harry enlisted in the US Air Force, they married after his basic training in California in 1953.  During their Air Force years, they lived in Arizona, Texas, South Carolina, Bermuda, New Jersey, and Illinois.  After Harry retired from the Air Force, they moved to Laurinburg, NC, in 1978, where they happily resided for the rest of their lives.  They loved to travel, especially out west, including spending an entire summer working at Yellowstone Park, visiting Alaska, and flying across the country with their close friends in an antique biplane.

Nancy came from a family of artists, including her uncle Mead Schaeffer, a famous illustrator who helped inspire her to pursue her art career.  She practiced, studied, and taught art in various media throughout her life.  After moving to NC, Nancy and Harry ran the Laurinburg art and framing shop ArtWorks for 10 years.  Later, she took additional classes at St. Andrews College, always passionately seeking to learn more and extend her talent.  Over her lifetime, she touched many lives with her work, including many portraits of friends and neighbors from Laurinburg, and ultimately focusing in her later career on pictures that drew from her deep Christian faith.

Nancy and Harry were members of the First United Methodist Church in Laurinburg. Over the years, she taught Sunday School, gave the Children’s Lesson at church, and was active in Disciple Studies and the Worship Committee.  Perhaps her biggest contribution there was to start the PUSH program (Pray Until Something Happens), which she faithfully attended weekly for years -- even when, at times, she was the only one to show up.  She will also be remembered for her artwork on the many thematic bulletin board displays she designed and produced, applying her talents in the service of our Lord.

Nancy is survived by her children and their spouses, Jeff and Lynette Sandgren, Kathy and Dave Bradford, and Dave and Kim Sandgren, plus seven grandchildren, eighteen great-grandchildren, six great-great-grandchildren … and all the friends and neighbors who are part of her “Laurinburg Family”.

Memorial Services will be held at Scotia Village on Wednesday, May 21, 2025 at 2:00 p.m. followed by visitation with the family.  She will be interred with her husband at a National Military Cemetery.

In lieu of flowers, Nancy requested donations be given in her memory to Scotland Regional Hospice for Morrison Manor, P.O. Box 1033, Laurinburg, NC 28353.

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