Juanita El Wanda Fischer, known by friends and family as Wanda, died April 14, 2022 in her daughter’s home in Bismarck, ND. She had been on hospice home care for five weeks prior to her death. We are thankful she simply died of old age, and not any disease. Her mind was sharp and clear up till the end when her little body just gradually gave out.

As a child she was an accomplished pianist and played for many high school graduations until her own. She played for her first wedding at age 12. She also grew up playing piano for her father’s church until she eventually got married. Then she and her husband then began traveling and ministering in churches all over the nation. Between them they sang and played seven+ instruments and billed themselves as The Musical Fischers of Men.

Along with her husband they pastored two Assembly of God churches in the 1950s, Vallejo, CA and Sparks, NV where she continued to play piano, Hammond organ, and the vibraharp for services. During those years she had the honor of accompanying a famous gospel singer of that era, Stuart Hamblen, in concert. (Hamblen was known as the writer of such songs as Until Then, This Ole’ House, How Big Is God, Teach Me, Lord, to Wait, It is No Secret What God Can Do, and many more.)

In 1965, after 25 years in ministry they settled in Sidney, MT where their daughter went to high school, and they went into business and made a great impact in the city through their motel, mobile home sales lot, and several mobile home subdivisions. Wanda helped her husband as secretary and bookkeeper during that time.

Wanda was known for her hospitality, cooking and baking, all types of needlework, especially counted cross-stitch, and her love of shopping for new clothes.

She was an only child herself, and had only one child, a daughter, Becky Fischer. But she and her husband Jerry were loved as surrogate parents and grandparents of several nephews, Mark, Gary, and Randy Rohner, and their children, who cared for them and treated them lovingly as their own parents and grandparents throughout their lives.

Wanda lived long enough to celebrate her 94th birthday in December and outlived her husband by eight months. Jerry passed away 2 days after their 72nd Wedding Anniversary in August. After being residents of Sidney for some 50 years, Jerry and Wanda moved to Bismarck to live with their daughter in May of 2021 when they could no longer live alone.