Antoinette Stanton Jungster
Antoinette (Toni) Jungster, 88, passed away peacefully at North Valley Hospital on Nov. 11, 2016.
She was born Nov. 19, 1927, in Seattle, Washington, to Edgar Stanton and Antoinette Shumway Stanton. She grew up in Seattle during the hard times of the Great Depression and World War II.
Toni’s favorite memories of her childhood growing up in Seattle in the 1930s included spending summers in the family cabin on Hood Canal, digging clams, rowing on the Canal with her sister Emily, frying doughnuts, and having the best Sunday fried chicken dinner with her favorite grandmother Basha Stanton.
Toni graduated Cum Laude with a degree in botany from the University of Washington. She met her future husband, Hans Jungster on a University of Washington field trip to Montana led by Dr. Hitchcock in 1947. Toni and Hans married in 1949 and spent time at Alta Utah, then Estes Park, Colorado, where Hans worked for the National Park Service. She had fond memories of those early years and the people they knew.
Toni was a member of the Seattle Mountaineer Club and enjoyed climbing Mt. Rainer and other local mountains. Hans was a member of the U.S. Army 10th Mountain Division in World War II and they both shared an enjoyment and appreciation of the outdoors. There were many fall camping trips to Kintla Lake and summer walks to Preston Park to see the wildflowers.
Hans and Toni moved to Bigfork in 1955 and started the Forest and Fireside shop. It was a small tea house and gift shop. Toni did “all” the baking of scones, shortbread, pies, jam, and her mother-in-law’s cheesecake recipe. Hans and Toni built the Montana House gift shop in Apgar Village in 1959 which has promoted many Montana Artists over the decades. Toni was a weaver as well as a business woman. She would spend the winters on her loom in the Montana House. Hans passed away in 1967.
Toni lived in Apgar until 1990 and retired to Mallard Loop south of Whitefish where she built her dream home. She enjoyed her retirement years growing varieties of flowers and fruit trees. She always gave notice in the summer when pie cherries had been “picked by Jim” and in fall when she was making “Damsom plum jam.” Plums were also “picked by Jim!”
With the help of her best friends Eli, Coco, Chin Chin, Annie, Saki and Willie, (they all had four feet and purred loudly!) she watched every Seattle Mariner baseball game — no matter what. Toni collected Western books and authors and the “old west” intrigued her. She was an avid reader and was a crossword puzzle fanatic and could hardly wait for the Spring flower catalogs to be sent to her.
Toni read her newspaper every day and watched the news every night.
She never missed an election and sent her absentee ballot for the last time in 2016.
Toni was preceded in death by her husband Hans Jungster, her parents Edgar and Antoinette Stanton, and her Aunt Ruth Shumway.
She is survived by her two daughters and their husbands; Monica Jungster and Chuck Brasen, Leslie and Gerry Hunsinger; brothers, Lyman and Roland Stanton; sister Emily Schue; nieces and nephews.
Suggested donations in Toni’s memory may be made to Northwest Montana Humane Society at 752-7297.
Columbia Mortuary is caring for Toni’s family.