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Alice Kellum "Lani" Sprau died in Albuquerque on Wednesday, June 27, 2001 at the age of 95. On July 26, 1905, she was the first baby born at Alice Roosevelt Hospital in Berkeley, CA, hence her name. The first of four children of Ella Francis Powers and Charles Burton Neuman, she grew up in the East San Francisco Bay Area and Watsonville and lived in Oakland for many years before moving to Honolulu in the late 1940s. While working at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, she met and married Bob Sprau, a military policeman. She took up painting and adopted the name Lani from the street they lived on, Laniloa Road. They moved to New Mexico in 1955, when Bob became a firefighter at Sandia Base. Lani divided her time between Oakland and Albuquerque until his death in 1984. She returned to her home in Oakland until 1996, When she moved to Santa Cruz. In 1999, she moved back to Albuquerque to be near family members. Lani was preceded in death by her brother, Charles Neuman in 1974; by her husband, Bob in 1984; and by her son, Keith A. Kellum, in 1988. She is survived by her family in Albuquerque, her daughter-in-law, Sharon Kellum Neuman; her grandson, Owen Kellum; and her nephew, Dick Neuman. She is also survived by her sister, Evelyn Neuman Vossbrink of Sunnyvale, CA; and her brother, Bill Neuman of San Diego. The family wishes to acknowledge with gratitude the staff members at Hilldale Residential Care Home for the excellent and warm care they gave Lani in the last two years of her life.
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