Ingrid Marion Sigler, 80

    Ingrid Marion Sigler, of Dover, Delaware, passed peacefully from this life to the next in the company of her husband of 51 years on July 9, 2026.
    Ingrid was born on April 14, 1946, to the late Jan van Oudenallen and Maria Antonia (van der Horst) van Oudenallen in the town of Hilversum, The Netherlands (Holland). Ingrid and her family immigrated to the United States in 1956 at which time the family name was Americanized from “van Oudenallen” to Van Allen. Upon arrival here in America, Ingrid and her family first lived in Patterson, New Jersey and later moved to Ridgewood and then Ramsey, New Jersey.
    Known as Inge (pronounced “Inga”) to family and friends, Ingrid became a proud American citizen in 1961 and later graduated from Ramsey High School in 1965 after which she attended Clermont Secretarial School, working in Bergan County, New Jersey as a medical secretary.
    Ingrid and her parents moved to Delaware in 1970, living first in Milford and then in Harbeson where they founded and ran Route 5 Antiques. Ingrid found employment later that year with the Delaware State Police at Troop 7. In 1975 she transferred to Delaware State Police Headquarters, serving in Traffic, Criminal, Intelligence, and the Academy. Ingrid left her job with the State Police in 1985 to help her husband get through law school. Ingrid later worked for the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control and as a legal secretary for several Dover lawyers.
    Ingrid married John Charles Sigler in Christ Episcopal Church in Milford, Delaware on March 15, 1975, taking up residence first in Dover, then in Kenton, finally moving back to Dover in 1992 to a home built specifically to care for Ingrid’s mother who lived with the couple for almost 20 years. Ingrid and John enjoyed each other’s love and company for fifty-one (51) years. Not only were they husband and wife, they were also inseparable best friends.
    Although Ingrid and John had no children, Ingrid loved the German Shepherd dogs she called “my little girls,” Jackie, Jessie, Thea, and Mia.
    Ingrid had a “green thumb” and loved to work in the garden, raise and tend to plants in the home, and to weave. She and John also loved to travel, to hunt, and shoot sporting clays together.
    Ingrid loved America and during her lifetime traveled to every state of the union except Hawaii. She hunted game birds, waterfowl, and big game with John and her friends throughout the United States, South Africa, Scotland, Zambia, and Argentina. Among her many accomplishments as a sportswoman, Ingrid was Delaware’s Lady Sporting Clays Champion three times.
    Ingrid loved the water and was an avid swimmer, swimming a mile or more at the Dover YMCA every morning for many years.
    Ingrid and John loved to watch the migratory geese as they came down from Canada to make Delaware their winter home. Ingrid enjoyed watching songbirds and other feathered and furry creatures as they visited her yard and garden in the summer and her feeders in the winter.
    Ingrid was an avid reader and a student of American history. She especially loved to read the writings of the Founders, focusing on the Revolution, and the early days of the American Republic. She was a dedicated student of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and was an avid defender of the Second Amendment. She was a Benefactor Member of the National Rifle Association of America for which she served as “NRA’s First Lady” during John’s national presidency. She was also a dedicated Life Member of the Delaware State Sportsmen’s Association.
    Ingrid is survived by her husband, John, and her brothers, Nico Van Allen of Tucson, AZ and Arnold Van Allen of Middleburg, FL.
  Funeral Services will be held on July 25, 2026, at 11 am. in Christ Episcopal Church in Milford, 200 Church Street, Milford, DE 19963, with interment in The Church Yard immediately following the service. Friends are invited to gather at the church for visitation during the hour prior to the service.
    In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made in Ingrid’s memory to the DSSA Civil Rights Defense Fund, P.O. Box 94, Lincoln, Delaware 19960.
    May John’s beloved Ingrid rest in peace forever and ever, Amen.