Janet Marie Brennan

Janet Marie Deinzer Brennan, 92, entered into eternal life on January 30, 2024, with her daughter and granddaughters by her side at Alto Senior Living in Stuart, just as they finished praying a decade of the Rosary and the Memorare, one of her favorite prayers. We can only imagine the joyous welcome that awaited her from her beloved husband, Robert Thomas (1929-2006), son, William John (1958-2015), and sister, Nancy Wall (1929-2019), who she missed so very much in recent years.

Janet was born on June 30, 1931, at St. Peter’s Hospital, in New Brunswick, NJ, to Willard and Anna Carroll Deinzer, the second of their three children. She was the epitome of the “middle child,” an independent social butterfly, who made friends easily, and maintained and cherished many of those friendships throughout her life. She attended St. Peter’s elementary and high schools, graduating in 1948 at 16 years of age. As family lore has it, Janet was invited to join a high school friend at a birthday party, where she caught the eye of a young Bob Brennan, who told his friends “That’s the girl I’m going to marry.”  Janet graduated from Newark State Teacher’s College (now Kean University) in 1952 and began her teaching career in East Brunswick, NJ. She gathered regularly with her college teacher friends for over 40 years. She and Bob married at St. Peter’s Catholic Church in New Brunswick on June 20, 1953, and had two children, Carroll Ann and Billy. 

Bob’s work took the family from New Jersey to Rocky Hill, CT and Seekonk, MA, before they eventually returned to NJ in 1966, this time to Baker Road in Livingston, where they had many wonderful neighbors and friends with whom they enjoyed block parties, progressive dinners, ski trips, camping trips, family vacations, cruises and even a tour of Italy. They were active members of St. Philomena Catholic Church in Livingston where they participated in “Cana Bridge” and Janet volunteered as a lector and with the RCIA program. While in Livingston, Janet also volunteered at St. Barnabas Hospital and for Meals on Wheels. Janet taught second grade for many years in East Hanover, NJ. She was the kind of teacher everyone wanted their children to have and found great joy in the progress her students made from the beginning of each year to the end – at the time, cursive handwriting was being taught in second grade and she loved to compare their writing samples in June to those in September. When prayer was no longer allowed in school, she had a “moment of silence” every morning in her classroom. She attended her students’ First Communion celebrations every year and hosted a party for them at her home at the end of each school year. As a testament to the impact she had on her students, she still receives a yearly Christmas letter from a former student who is now a grandmother herself!

Although they never lost their love for the Jersey Shore, in 1984 Janet and Bob began enjoying yearly trips to Hutchinson Island where they had timeshare at Plantation Beach Club (and where they enticed a few Baker Road neighbors to join them). Of course, they made some wonderful friends there, with whom they enjoyed golf, tennis, cocktails at the pool, Martin County restaurants, and parties in the Gardenia Room. Anticipating spending more time in Florida near the beach, they purchased a condo at Jensen Beach Club. When retirement was nearing, they decided to move to a golf community and built a house at Lost Lake in Hobe Sound in 1994. When their daughter and son-in-law and family relocated to Martin County in 1995, they became full-time Florida residents and members of St. Christopher Catholic Church.  In 2001, they moved to Sewall’s Point to be closer to their grandchildren’s many school and social activities, as well as to Janet’s sister, Nancy, who had moved to Jensen Beach. That same year, Janet began delivering Meals on Wheels, a service she continued until the pandemic began in March 2020.

Janet and Bob loved to travel and often gave their children and grandchildren the gift of travel, Walt Disney World starting in 1974, ski trips to New England and Colorado, a family vacation in Ireland in 1990, and cruises starting in 1997. They shared a love of golf, bridge, and dining out regularly. When Bob’s health began declining in 1999, Janet became his primary caregiver, a role she valiantly continued until his death in 2006. She continued to play bridge 3-4 times per week, enjoyed visits to her daughter and son-in-law’s lake house in Wisconsin, and treasured the memories of a couple mother-daughter Disney cruises in 2018 and 2019. She enjoyed her daily newspaper, the Stuart News, and challenged herself with the Crossword and Word Jumble regularly; she was not happy when they stopped publishing the paper on Saturdays! She tried to keep up with technology with the help of her grandchildren and enjoyed Facebook and Words with Friends on her iPhone. During the pandemic, television became her lifeline, especially EWTN, the Game Show Network, and Blue Bloods reruns. 

Janet suffered a hip fracture in May 2022 and moved to assisted living in December 2022, first to Addington Place and then to Alto Senior Living, where she enjoyed socializing with other residents, playing bingo, and eating moose tracks ice cream for dessert at nearly every meal!  We were fortunate to have the compassionate services of her Senior Helpers’ caregivers and the invaluable resource of Treasure Coast Hospice these past few months as her health declined.

Janet was predeceased by her beloved husband, Robert Thomas Brennan, and son, Corporal William John Brennan (Livingston Police Department), as well as by her parents, Willard and Anna Carroll Deinzer; her sister and brother-in-law, Nancy and John Wall; her sister-in-law, Joan Deinzer; her parents-in-law, John and Catherine Brennan; her brother-in-law, Jack Brennan; her sisters-in-law and brothers-in-law, Catherine (Brennan) and Gerow Brill and Margaret (Brennan) and Jack McNally; her nephew, Paul McNally; her son-in-law’s parents, Harold and Ann Barbara Carlson; and countless relatives and friends she mourned in this life with whom she is now reunited.

Janet is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Drs. Carroll Ann Brennan and William Eric Carlson of Stuart, FL; her grandchildren Sean William (of Stuart), Brynn Rachel (of Jensen Beach), Clare Anna (of Port St. Lucie), and Riley James Robert (of Springfield, VA) Carlson; her granddaughter, Meghan Elizabeth Brennan (of Dublin, Ireland); her brother, Willard Deinzer of Las Vegas, NV; her nieces and nephews and their families, John Wall (Janet), Tricia Kohn (Mark), Cindy Tibert (Jim), Christopher Wall, Jack McNally (Rita), Maureen McNally, and Rita McNally (Paul’s wife); her special friends, Charlotte Szabo (NJ), Mary Brede(NJ), Terry Rose(RI), and June Fleeman(OH) and countless other friends she loved and cherished throughout her long and blessed life.

Visitation will be held at Martin Funeral Home on Friday, February 9 from 5:00 to 7:00 PM (961 S. Kanner Highway, Stuart, FL 34994) www.Martin-Funeral.com  

A Mass of Christian Burial will be held at St. Christopher Catholic Church on Saturday, February 10 at 11:00 AM (12001 SE Federal Highway, Hobe Sound, FL 33455) with burial to follow at Fernhill Memorial Gardens (1501 S Kanner Highway, Stuart, FL 34994). Please wear your favorite shade of blue, Janet’s favorite color.

Janet had a special devotion to St. Anthony who was known for his extraordinary love for the poor, especially expressed in feeding the hungry. If you would like to honor her memory with a donation, please consider St. Christopher’s St. Vincent de Paul Society https://www.svdp-hobesound.org/give_help.php  The Treasure Coast Food Bank https://stophunger.org/waystogive/ , Food for the Poor https://foodforthepoor.org/ , or similar organization of your choosing.