Deirdre R. Dreyer

Deirdre R. Dreyer, 41, Teacher Deirdre Regina Dreyer (nee O'Connor), a Cranford resident and former teacher at the Allen W. Roberts Elementary School in New Providence, died May 30 on a family trip in San Diego, CA, following a long illness. Funeral services will take place Sunday, June 5, from 4 to 8 p.m. at the Gray Memorial Funeral Home, 12 Springfield Avenue, Cranford, to be followed on Monday, June 6, with a service at 11 a.m. at the First Presbyterian Church, 11 Springfield Avenue, Cranford. Internment will be private. The family asks that donations be made to Liddy Shriver Sarcoma Initiative, 17 Bethea Drive, Ossining, NY 10562. Born April 11, 1970, in Wantagh, NY and raised in Beverly, NJ, Mrs. Dreyer was a graduate of Holy Cross High School, Delran, NJ, where she was inducted into the National Honor Society. She majored in elementary education at St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia after being awarded a New Jersey Governor's Teaching Scholarship upon graduation from Holy Cross High School. Mrs. Dreyer earned her masters degree with honors from Kean University. Mrs. Dreyer's abilities as a fifth grade teacher at the Roberts School were recognized with a Union County Teacher Recognition Award in 1998. Despite her heroic battle with cancer for the past seven years, she managed to join fifth graders and their families at the Roberts School last December for the annual gingerbread house-making event that she founded ten years earlier. She also had been very active in the Bloomingdale Avenue School community in Cranford. Mrs. Dreyer previously taught in the Willingboro, NJ school district. She also had been a member of the Junior League of Elizabeth-Plainfield. In addition to loving husband, Henry A. Dreyer III, and daughter, Shea Elizabeth, 8, she is survived by her father, Martin O'Connor and stepmother Vicky O'Connor of Columbus, NJ; her brothers Martin O'Connor II and his wife, Denise, of Edgewater Park, NJ and Edward O'Connor of Brooklyn, NY. Also surviving are her loving father-in-law and mother-in-law, Henry A. Dreyer, Jr. and Carol Dreyer, and brother-in-law, Brett Dreyer and his wife, Nicole. She was predeceased by her mother, Marian Cuddy O'Connor.