Joan Snider passed away at home in La Jolla, California, on February 28, 2023, after 93 grand years of life. She had been diagnosed with congestive heart failure and called on hospice for support in her final days. Joan was born in West Frankfort, Illinois, on October 24, 1929, the day of the 1929 stock market crash. When Joan was seven, her parents Frank and Lee Margaret Trobaugh took her to a St. Louis Symphony concert to help her decide what instrument she wanted to play in the school band. She chose the harp. At 19, she moved to New York City to study under Carlos Salzedo. By age 22 she’d landed the First Harpist position of the Minneapolis Symphony under Antal Dorati. But Joan couldn’t wait to return to Greenwich Village to a charming engineer named Chuck Snider who she married in 1951. In 1958 they bought two convertibles and moved to Pasadena, Calif., where Chuck launched a career in international sales. In 1975, they relocated to Beirut, where the marriage fell apart, but happily, they and new partners all settled in London for a new round of expat adventures.
Joan’s stories were legendary, and all true… from playing the harp under Maestros Leopold Stokowski and Bruno Walter, to disarming roadblock kidnappers in Beirut with her charm during the early days of the Lebanese Civil War, to smuggling dollars into Prague in the top of her panty hose for her Amnesty International affiliated boyfriend to give to prominent Czech dissidents in the mid-1980s (and staying calm and composed at Prague Airport when she was pulled aside for special questioning). Joan was known for her love of design, notoriously pilfering her grocery budget to save up to buy a Saarinen Womb chair as a young wife. Some of Joan’s happiest years were living in St. James (London) in the mid-1980s, spending most nights eating dover sole at the bar on “her” stool at Wheeler’s Duke of York Street.
Joan finally found her permanent home in La Jolla in 1984. She loved volunteering on the Housing Committee for the La Jolla Chamber Music Society’s SummerFest, and attending all the wonderful concerts. The highlight of Joan’s last couple of months was Wine Time each evening—enjoying wine and cheese with dear friends while sharing the latest happenings, and listening to the ocean outside her window. Please drink a toast of Sancerre to Joan—to her fearless pursuit of adventure, her keen sense of style, and her genuine interest in everyone she met. Joan is survived by her daughter Lee Ann (Jud) Groshong, grandson Tyler Groshong, “adopted sons” Kevin Pearson and Peter Smith, niece Marlee Mitchell, and nephew Joe Steelman. She is predeceased by her brother Dr. Frank Trobaugh and her sister Lee Margaret Steelman.
Donations in Joan’s memory can be made to the La Jolla Music Society; please email fgasang@ljms.org noting that the donation is in memory of Joan Snider.
—Originally published in La Jolla Light on Mar. 16, 2023
