Louisa Fleming

Louisa Troutman Fleming, a resident of Iredell County, died peacefully on Friday, December 5, 2025, at Maple Leaf nursing home in Statesville, NC. She was born on December 3, 1944, on an exceptionally cold day and passed from this world on a similar December day. She was 81 years old.

Louisa is survived by seven siblings, children of the late John Morrison Troutman, Jr., and Annie Blair Rash Troutman. The surviving siblings are Catherine Smith, Ellen Zaig, John Samuel Troutman, David L. (Rudy) Troutman, Alice Dawson, Joe M. Troutman, and Susan Black.

Life on our hard-scrabble family farm was both idyllic and a physical grind. We shared the work of growing and tending crops, vegetables, fruits, and melons with our parents. Our duties also included milking cows and looking after livestock. Add to that hoeing and picking cotton and picking wild blackberries in some of the wilder fields. We were children who worked for our daily bread, and Louisa, being the oldest, certainly took on her share of those chores. But during the hot days of summer we also played in the creek and on rainy days played in the hayloft. Louisa was right along with us too.

After graduation from high school, Louisa attended classes at Mitchell College until she married and moved to Buffalo, New York. There she began a decades-long employment with AT&T, at that time the largest telecom company in America. She rose to a position of selling and liaising in the installation of business telephone systems. Also, during her time in Buffalo, she served as a union rep in the Telecommunications Workers of America. Following her move to Charlotte in the 1980s, she continued in this employment.

Louisa had several lifelong interests which she pursued in her private life. As a lover of written and spoken language, she was a fine storyteller and wrote poetry. Some of her younger siblings have fond memories of her as she approached adolescence spinning up stories for us and illustrating them by drawing in the sand.

In the visual field, she evinced a lively interest in color and patterns through her love of interior decorating, fashion, and flower gardening. Her yearly crop of daylilies of many forms and colors brought her much delight. Combining her love of words and flowers, she wrote a fine poem in praise of the beauties of daylilies.

Though Louisa had no children of her own, she participated enthusiastically in the lives of her nieces, nephews, grandnieces, and grandnephews and her large extended family of aunts, uncles, and cousins. In the context of extended family, Louisa served several terms as secretary for the Troutman Family Association. In addition, she had a vibrant relationship with her stepdaughter, Courtney Fleming. Her exuberant personality often made her the center of gatherings. This liveliness combined with personal traits of empathy, kindness, and a loving nature made her a sibling we will sorely miss.

Funeral arrangements are being handled by Troutman Funeral Home in Troutman, NC.