Bertha Sonderling, a longtime resident of Northbrook, died Sunday at Highland Park Hospital. From the age of 7 to 14, Mrs. Sonderling was raised in a Jewish orphanage with her brother in Vienna. Her father had died and her mother was unable to support the two children as a dressmaker. When Hitler’s Nazi regime invaded her native land, Mrs. Sonderling fled with her husband to Chicago. She lived in Rogers Park for about 12 years before moving to Highland Park. Mrs. Sonderling eventually moved to Northbrook 20 years ago. For 12 years in the 1960s, she worked as an executive assistant for H. Earl Hoover, the former chairman of Hoover Co., the vacuum cleaner company. Survivors include her husband, Ernest; and a son, Steven. Services were Wednesday.
