TORRINGTON – A celebration of life for Virginia Helene Rieb, 83, will be held 1 p.m. Saturday January 25, 2025, at the First Congregational Church with Reverend Matt Gordon officiating. Virginia passed away peacefully on January 19, 2025, at her home. Cremation has taken place. Memorials can be made to the Senior Friendship Center in Torrington. Colyer Funeral Home assisted the family with the cremation arrangements and friends may send their condolences to the family at www.colyerfuneralhome.com.
Virginia was born April 15, 1941, in Torrington to Carl and Helen (Chaffee) Carr. She grew up in Torrington as one of five children. She married Johnnie Rummell on July 5, 1958, and to this union Tracy and Terry were born. Virginia was a very devoted mother and wife to her family and always made sure their needs were met before her own.
As adults, Virginia and her sister Carol were proud to be part of the first Goshen County group to receive their GED’s. After getting her GED she went on to get a certificate in cosmetology and became a beautician. She started doing hair in Torrington until the family moved to Saratoga where she opened her own salon. Between the two towns she had over thirty years under her belt.
Virginia loved to help those feel best about themselves and she often did hair for free out of the kindness of her heart. She was also very proud of the antique shop she and her husband Johnnie owned in Saratoga.
Among her many talents, she was also a switchboard operator. A notable trip she took with her husband Johnnie and grandson Nathan was to be a part of the Wyoming Bicentennial Wagon Train that went all the way from Cheyenne to Cody. The three of them spent several days reenacting Wyoming history.
After the death of her husband Johnnie in 2007, Virginia married Marvin Rieb in 2010. Together they shared fourteen years of traveling the world, gardening, and adventuring together. Virginia was very involved in her grandchildren and great-grandchildren’s lives as they were growing up. She taught them all how to live life to the fullest as well as the simple skills necessary in life. Virginia was proud of the fact she got to welcome a great-great grandchild to the family. She was a caregiver to many and never knew a stranger. Her generous and loving personality will live on forever in all the lives she touched. Some of Virginia’s hobbies included rock collecting, gardening, tending to her flowers, going to the mountains, garage sales with her granddaughter, and her occasional trip to the casino, but most of all spending time with those she loved.
Virginia is survived by her husband Marvin Rieb; children, Tracy (Kevin) Flock and Terry (Casi) Rummell; grandchildren, Nathan (Stacey) Cook, Lauren (Luis) Correa, April (Jojo) Ojeda and Michelle (Taylor) Derra; ten great-grandchildren and one great-great grandchild; her siblings, Carol Peterson, Ralph (RoseAnn) Carr, Bill (Carol) Carr, and a stepdaughter Shellee Wells. As well as numerous extended family members.
She is preceded in death by her first husband Johnnie Rummell; her sister Pat Martin; great-granddaughters, Madison Cook and Willow Derra and a stepdaughter Andrea Johnson.
