Marcella Mary Miller was born to Lawrence T. Johnston and Irene B. Johnston, née Grenadier, on October 8, 1922, at Adventist Hospital in Glendale, California.
With the exception of a brief three-year hiatus in Honolulu, Hawaii, from 1952 to 1955, where she gave birth to her only child, Byron, she has lived her entire life in Southern California with the exception of a year (1967) in the Sacramento area and two years in the San Jose suburb of Los Gatos (1968-70).
A graduate of both Glendale High School (’39) and Glendale College (’41), Marcella held positions with Horst & Cummings & Myers, TWA and United Airlines, while playing an active role as a founding member in her Theta Chi Epsilon sorority’s activities.
She was married in 1950 to the late Bill Lee Miller, employed in Southern California by the Long Beach Press Telegram, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Mirror, Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, Pasadena Star-News and Santa Monica Evening Outlook newspapers along with the Honolulu Star Bulletin, Sacramento Union and San Jose Mercury News during his long career as a reporter and editor.
The last 35 years of her life were spent living in the same home in Pacific Palisades, where she worked for 19 years at the Los Angeles City Library’s Pacific Palisades Branch as a librarian assistant, a job she thoroughly enjoyed since she was able to develop lasting friendships with so many community residents.
She passed away on October 21 from congestive heart failure.
Flowers can be sent to Forest Lawn in Glendale where a graveside ceremony open to anyone wishing to attend will be held at 11 a.m. on November 3.
This page is available to subscribers. Click here to sign in or get access.