A public Celebration of Life service will be held this weekend for former Georgia First Lady Sandra Deal. The service is scheduled for 2 p.m. Saturday, August 27, at the Ramsey Center at Lanier Technical College in Gainesville. Attendees will have an opportunity to visit with the family following the ceremony until 5 p.m.
Governor Brian Kemp has ordered flags to fly at half-staff Saturday in honor and memory of Deal who passed away Tuesday from cancer. She was 80.
A 15-year veteran of teaching language arts in Hall County, she committed to touring Georgia’s classrooms and reading to students after her husband Nathan Deal was elected governor in 2011.
During eight years in the Governor’s Mansion, she completed her commitment, having read to students in all of Georgia’s 159 counties, including more than 1,000 schools and pre-K programs. She also oversaw donations of thousands of books and advocated tirelessly for Georgia’s students to get the resources they needed.
Sandra Deal was born Emilie Sandra Dunagan in Gainesville, Georgia, on Feb. 1, 1942. She attended Georgia College and State University at Milledgeville, earning a bachelor’s in elementary education in 1963 and a master’s in elementary education in 1968. She married Nathan Deal in 1966.
The couple married in 1966 and have four children and six grandchildren. The Deals retired to Habersham County after he was term-limited out of the governor’s office in 2018.
The Celebration of Life will be streamed online for those unable to attend in person, and information can be found at the Memorial Park Funeral Home website or this link.
In place of flowers, the family has established “The Deal Foundation” to continue the work that Sandra Deal found important: scholarships, reading advocacy, book distribution, and many other noble literacy efforts for Georgia’s children and students. Donations can be made here or at The Deal Foundation, PO Box 2, Demorest, GA 30535.
Emilie Sandra Dunagan Deal obituary
