She and her husband, Bill, later moved to a senior community in Wheeling, where her room was filled with angel figurines, posters and copies of her books. Co-authored with friend Ann Toland Serb, the book sold mostly to friends and family, and her $300 share of the sales paid for a new washing machine.Īnderson wrote about a half dozen other books - mostly nonfiction - before she was inspired by her son's tow truck rescue story. Her first book, 'Love, Lollipops and Laundry,' came three years later. She made $25 selling her first story to a diaper magazine in 1973. Amid her busy family life, she would try to find time to write, starting with family humor magazine articles that often came from her husband's and children's true tales. Shops selling angel-related items - books, statues, gifts and anything with a halo - began popping up.Īnd Anderson continued to write books, speak to groups and do interviews, becoming an expert of sorts in the national angel craze.Īfter purchasing a home in Arlington Heights in the early 1970s, Anderson started writing as a way to bring home a second income for her family of seven. 'Touched By An Angel' debuted on TV in 1994. But angels soon became a cottage industry. Though a deeply religious Catholic, Anderson initially was skeptical anyone would buy a book of angel stories. We all end up being answers to other people's prayers.' But everybody has something special they have to do. 'Human nature is human nature, and it will move as it will. Visitation will be Sunday, August 14, 2022, from 2:00 pm until 6:00 pm at Glueckert Funeral Home, Ltd., 1520 North Arlington Heights Road (four blocks south of Palatine Road), Arlington Heights. 'I haven't discovered the whole meaning of life except that God made a beautiful world and wants us to share it,' Anderson told Constable on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of her first angel book. 'People wanted to be included in what I later discovered was a really important movement around the country,' Anderson told now-retired Daily Herald columnist Burt Constable in 2017.Īnderson started compiling angel stories after one of her five children told her how his car broke down on a snowy night around Christmas, and a tow truck appeared out of nowhere to pull him to safety, then disappeared without leaving tire tracks. That led to a book tour, speaking engagements across the country and appearances on national television - including interviews with Oprah Winfrey, Larry King, Tom Brokaw, Jerry Springer, Joan Rivers and Sally Jessy Raphael - as popularity around angels grew. 'Where Angels Walk: True Stories of Heavenly Visitors' was Anderson's 1993 breakout that spent 55 weeks on The New York Times Best Sellers list, selling more than 2 million copies. A visitation was held Friday evening at Glueckert Funeral Home, and memorial services are scheduled for Saturday.

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