Wendi Winters

Winters was an editor and community reporter for the Capital Gazette, writing several weekly columns.

The 65-year-old moved to Maryland after working for two public relation agencies in New York and “owning her own boutique agency in the Big Apple,” her staff bio said.

Her skills as a journalist came from her experience in “retailing, wholesaling, art design, apparel and accessories design, management, public relations, modeling, styling, casting, event planning, motherhood – instead of 4-years at a j-school,” she wrote in her LinkedIn profile.

Winters had a fashion design degree from Virginia Commonwealth University and organized campaigns and special events for companies such as J.C. Penney, Sears Roebuck & Co. and Gimbels, according to her profile.

She was an active volunteer with the Girl Scouts and Red Cross and had founded an annual event in Annapolis called P.R. Bazaar, where local journalists and public relations professionals meet to learn from each other.

“My mother was a wonderful woman and a fantastic reporter,” her daughter Winters Geimer told The Baltimore Sun as the family gathered Thursday. “Her life was a gift to everyone who knew her and the world will not be the same without her. We are grieving and trying to make sure all of us can be together to celebrate the life of our mother.”