Gisela Hannelore Daschkey Ahern

Gisela Hannelore Daschkey Ahern was born in Neuendorf, East Prussia (now part of Poland) on 10 August 1940. She was raised in Offenbach am Main in then-West Germany. She earned a business degree in Offenbach before joining the German Foreign Ministry in 1961. The next year, she was posted to Saigon, South Vietnam, where she met her future husband, US Embassy officer Thomas L. Ahern, Jr. They married in Offenbach in 1965, and took up residence in northern Virginia. In 1966, the couple began a series of foreign assignments, first with the US Army and then the Central Intelligence Agency. They went first to the Philippines, where their daughter Christine was born in 1967, then to Cambodia, Nigeria, and Germany. Gisela joined the CIA in 1980, and retired in 2001. She then worked as an analyst at the National Counter-Terrorism Center until December 2016. Always concerned to make life better for the people around her, Gisela successfully combined her professional career with unfailing support to her family, in the process becoming a truly accomplished cook. While working at the NCTC, she served as a volunteer ombudsman at an assisted living facility in Arlington where she made many devoted friends. Later, as a member of the Board of the Guild of the Washington Concert Opera, she took on yet a second volunteer job helping manage its finances. Gisela passed away on 17 March 2017, the victim of an extraordinarily aggressive cancer. One of her friends wrote: “She was a wonderful, fun, adorable human. I will miss her terribly.” He is not alone. Gisela is survived by her husband of 52 years; a daughter, Christine Oswald; two grandchildren, Ellie and Michael; and a half-brother, Guenter Schaupmeier.