Sandi Codding

Sandi Codding, who died in her sleep April 17 at age 70, was remembered by friends and family as an elegant, beautiful woman with perfect manners and a love of couture who had an ease with everyone she met.

"Her mother used to say Sandi never met a stranger," said her husband, Jim Codding.

He recalled a White House dinner they attended when Ronald Reagan was president and a wildlife conservation event in 1982 where Jim and Sandi sat next to former President Gerald Ford.

"Those two went on and on," Jim Codding said. "He was completely captivated. But it didn't make a difference to her. She could talk to the ex-President of the United States or the guy who was here to fix the plumbing, and she could talk to them about anything."

Sandi Codding was a member — by birth and marriage — of two of Santa Rosa's most prominent families. She was the daughter of contractor and road builder Arthur Siri. Her second husband, Jim, is the nephew of developer Hugh Codding, whose building projects largely fueled Santa Rosa's post-World War II construction boom.

Jim and Sandi Codding were married in a house that Hugh Codding built on Midway Drive, where the couple lived and entertained many years. She, with Hugh Codding's wife, Nell, was a part owner of a fashion clothing store, Raffin?, in Montgomery Village. She served on the boards of the Codding Foundation and the Sonoma County Museum and attended President Reagan's 1985 inaugural dinner as a guest of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Michael Deaver, a family friend.

Sandi Codding was friendly and generous and spent much of her free time participating in charitable causes, her family said. She loved to cook, could tell a great story, and was proud that she was a scout leader for her children.

"The way I think of it is that anybody that knew her felt like they were her best friend," said Bedette Wilson, who grew up with Codding. "It's weird to say this, but as stylish as she was, she was never flashy. She was a very special person."

Jim Codding, 86, was Sandi's second husband. Despite being 17 years her senior, he said he spotted her at a wedding in 1978 and was smitten.

"She was 34 and looked 24," he said. "I was 51 and looked 51. I got it figured: it was 35 years and 7 months and 17 days ago."

Sandi Codding was born Feb. 15, 1944, and grew up in Santa Rosa. She was a member of the first graduating class to attend Ursuline High School for all four years at the campus it would use until its closure in 2011. Her father was instrumental in getting the school built.

She was a striking beauty, said friends — Jim Codding said she was often mistaken for the actress Jamie Curtis — and she modeled for department stores and charity fashion shows for most of life.

Her first marriage to builder James Clay ended in divorce. Later, Clay, then 38, and three of the couple's four children, Mitchell, Cameron and Stacey, were killed in a private plane crash in November 1980 on their way to a Thanksgiving ski trip.

The accident was traumatic, said Nancy Owen of Santa Rosa, Codding and Clay's surviving daughter. She said her mother continued to celebrate her children's lives on each of their birthdays.

"She was of course devastated by it," Owen said. "She could have retreated to a dark bedroom for the rest of her life and no one could have blamed her. But she came back from that. And she made a huge difference in the lives of many people."

Owen said Sandi and Jim Codding traveled extensively, including many trips to Europe and safaris in Africa, but her mother's passion was giving back, not only to family but to strangers. She kept a busy social calendar until her last days.

Her death surprised friends and family in part because she was so active, they said. But a little more than a week before she died, she fainted in her home.

She had been scheduled to undergo several medical tests, according to Owen, who said the last time she saw her mother was at a friend's funeral.

"It was just so strange," Owen said. "All the people there were part of the old guard. My mom got to see so many of her friends that day."

"I know people say they had the greatest mothers, but it's true about her," she said. "She was from a different time, so elegant and kind and yet so inclusive. I'm going to miss her terribly."

In addition to her daughter and husband, Codding is survived by stepchildren Jim Codding Jr. of Healdsburg, Nancy Codding of Santa Rosa, and Peter Codding of Santa Rosa; brother, Arthur Siri Jr. of Green Valley, Ariz.; and nine grandchildren.

Services will be held at 1 p.m. Tuesday at Star of the Valley Church in Oakmont.