June Elizabeth Miller

June Elizabeth Wasinack Miller, 85, loving caretaker and devout Christian, passed away in peace on May 10 just 2 days short of her 86th birthday. A child of the Great Depression, she was born in Cleveland, Ohio. She attended Lakewood High School and then nursing school, where she said her direct supervisor constantly told her that she was not good enough and would not likely make it, disparaging her efforts seemingly without reason. Despite this, her passion for nursing and perseverance carried her through, graduating from The Ohio State University Nursing School in 1948.

Like many in the midwest in those years, June seeked a new life in sunny southern California. She started her career at the Long Beach Veteran's Hospital, where she met and married her lifelong husband, Harry Miller. During a water basketball game in the hospital pool, Harry unknowingly gave her a black eye with an elbow while going for a ball. He sent her flowers and asked her out when he found out that he had hurt her. When he showed up for the date she was shocked to discover that he was a paraplegic, having only seen him from the neck up in the pool. Despite this, she fell in love with the person she would later call the greatest man of character she ever knew. With her care and support, Harry would go on to live nearly 60 more years in a wheelchair, something unheard of for paraplegics.

They built a wheelchair friendly house in Stanton on three cheap, cabbage-filled acres. June gave birth to a son, Mark, in 1955. They continued to live in Stanton for 30 years. June supported Harry by working two jobs so he could go to college (he had dropped out of high school for WWII). Her sacrifice enabled him to go to graduate with a degree in accounting, become a respected man in the community: elected to city councilman and mayor, a presidesnt of the local PONY baseball team that would go on to win a World Championship in 1970, and build a successful tax-consulting business, beating the incredible odds stacked against him. June worked over four decades as a school nurse, mostly at Pacifica HS in Garden Grove, but also worked summers at Disneyland, never complaining and still being an attentive, loving mother as well.

In '86 they sold the Stanton property and built their dream home in Santiago Canyon set amongst old oaks and rose gardens June attended to daily. Harry eventually passed away in 2006, but June continued on, involved in her grandchildren's lives and her church, Living Word in Mission Viejo. Through the years she supported many charities, and even took in a young single mother with a baby who called her "Grandma June."

After a brief hospital stay, June came home to leave this world with dignity and peace of her own bed in the sanctuary she designed and built with the love of her life. With her son, daughter-in-law, and grandchildren all at her side to say goodbye, she certainly must have known how deeply she was loved by all.

She leaves a son, Mark, sister Joan Selfridge, brother Wally Wasinack, and grandchildren Aaron, Derek, and Amanda Miller. We all miss her selfless courage and loving nature. She spent a life enabling all of us around her to battle through life's challenges and face them with quiet courage, sacrifice, and an indomitable spirit she displayed her entire life. She will be greatly missed.