Lanelle Clark Sansom, of the Oak Grove Community, passed away Sunday, September 13, 2026, six days after celebrating her 90th birthday.
Funeral services will be 3:00 PM, Thursday at Moore Cortner Funeral Home in Winchester. The family will receive visitors from 1:00 PM until service time on Thursday at the funeral home. Brother Jimmy Gray will officiate, with burial to follow at Mt. Garner Cemetery in Decherd.
For the last 21 months, she was a resident of the Lantern at Morning Point in Tullahoma. She was blessed with her new family of residence and under the care of a highly-trained professional and dedicated, loving staff.
She was born September 7, 1936, in Winchester, to the late Herman and Elna Ree Crabtree Clark. One of four children, her father passed away when she was two years old.
Life was hard for a widowed mother with four small children, but with the help of the good Lord, family, and neighbors, they survived and flourished, even after a copperhead snake bite as a small child. She was quickly taken up the mountain on horseback to the hospital in Sewanee, Tennessee. The Clark family was known for their strong work ethic and this continues today in the generations that have followed.
She retired from South Central Bell in 1986, after 30+ years of service. She retired to be part of her daughter’s growing family, where they were blessed with many opportunities for travel, vacations, and making memories with “Gram” and “Pa”. They were always, always a part of the entourage.
Never afraid to speak her mind, she instilled independence in her daughter to “always be able to take care of yourself”. She and her husband Herman were farmers, and they always had a second full-time job. She could drive a tractor and bale hay right along with Herman. They raised beef cattle and row cropped for a lot of years, retiring from farming when they were well into their eighties. A great compliment was paid to them: “You never heard them complain about having to go to work”.
In addition to her parents, she is preceded in death by her husband of 70 years, Herman Sansom, in April 2025; a sister, Dorothy Robertson, of Huntsville; brothers, Ray Clark, of Wartrace, and Auburn Clark, of Bell Buckle, and her brother-in-law, Joe Robertson, of Huntsville.
Survivors include her daughter, Pamela Sansom Feldhaus, and her husband David, of Shelbyville; grandchildren, David Feldhaus, Jr. and his wife Erin, William Feldhaus, and Andrew Feldhaus, and his wife Karen, all of Shelbyville; Katie Feldhaus Jackson, and her husband Jeffrey, of Nashville and Shelbyville; great grandchildren, Emory James Feldhaus, Maxwell Brent Feldhaus, and Andrew “ Andy” Phillip Feldhaus, all of Shelbyville; sisters in law, Glynn Clark of Wartrace and Terry Clark of Bell Buckle, numerous nieces, nephews, and cousins and great nieces and nephews.
The family would like to thank the skilled and caring staff of The Lantern at Morning Point, Hospice Compassus, and Peggy’s girls, who greatly assisted Gram and Pam in her care.
Lanelle would be honored with memorials to: Attn: Vanderbilt University Medical Center
Vanderbilt Memory and Alzheimer’s Center, P. O. Box 290369, Nashville, TN 37229.
