Grace and Gladys

Wellman’s Goodwin Dining Center honors two sisters for their years of volunteering

Posted 11/21/19

The Goodwin Dining Center in Wellman was a special place in the lives of Grace and Gladys Miller. The two women were fixtures in the center in the later years of their lives.

Sunday relatives and …

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Grace and Gladys

Wellman’s Goodwin Dining Center honors two sisters for their years of volunteering

Posted

The Goodwin Dining Center in Wellman was a special place in the lives of Grace and Gladys Miller. The two women were fixtures in the center in the later years of their lives.

Sunday relatives and friends of the two Wellman natives gathered to remember the women and tell stories of their lives.

“This was Grace’s home,” Director Leroy Powell said. “She was here at 8 o’clock every morning.”

“There was no two like them,” cousin Arlene Miller said.

The two sisters lived together in their home just east of downtown Wellman. Until his death in 1994, their father Ortis, who operated Miller’s Feed Service, lived in the home they moved to in 1928.

Several people recalled seeing the television in the house tuned to college basketball games, which the two women loved watching – Ortis, Grace and Gladys each sitting in their respective chairs.

Gladys was 89 when she died in 2014, and Grace was 93 when she died in 2018.

Gladys had a driver’s license; Grace never did. Gladys would drive, and Grace would read the map and provide directions.

After Gladys moved to Parkview, Grace moved to an apartment and walked to the senior center each day where she arrived promptly at 8 a.m. to start the coffee.

Jean Schneider, whose mother was a cousin, said, “I knew them since I was a little girl.”

For the last 10 years of Grace’s life, Schneider took care of her.

“I learned a lot from her,” she said. “She’s a very patient person. She’d never get too excited; she was always calm.”

Powell recalled Grace did not talk much; she listened a lot.

Gladys talked even less.

“Gladys was always real quiet,” Powell said. “I don’t know if she said 10 words the entire time I was here.”

A plaque with the sisters’ pictures will hang on the wall and tell the story of their years of volunteer work at the senior center.

The information comes from a 2002 article in the Wellman Advance.

It tells how they volunteered at the center for almost 20 years. The two were honored as outstanding senior volunteers in Washington County in 2002.

The story tells how they arrived at the center each day to set up tables and help in the kitchen. For years they washed dishes every day until the center bought a dishwasher.

More than two dozen people attended the open house to remember the sisters Sunday and share stories.

“I’m sure all of you were an important part of her life,” Powell said.