Helen Rebecca (Miller) Chisholm
Date de naissance : 29 octobre 1918
Lieu de décès : Nevada Valley
Date de décès : 15 août 2015
Helen Rebecca (Miller) Chisholm, 96, passed away peacefully at home on Saturday, Aug. 15, 2015, as the result of a stroke.
Born in Brook Village, on Oct. 29, 1918, she was the youngest child of Lewis Levi and Margaret (MacAskill) Miller.
She is survived by her only daughter, Carole Margaret Chisholm, Nevada Valley, with whom she resided.
She was predeceased by her husband of 48 years, Albert Warren Chisholm, in 1991. She was also predeceased by her four brothers, Irving, Norman, John and Walter and her sister, Irene and two sisters-in-law, Pauline Miller and Ethel Miller-Schevink.
Besides her daughter, she is survived by her two nephews, Paul (Suzanne) Miller, Port Hawkesbury, and James (JoAnn) Miller, Sudbury, Ont.; her grandnieces, Melissa (Aaron) Oakley, Orlando, Fla., and Molly Jo Miller, Sudbury, Ont.; a grandnephew, Timothy Miller, Port Hawkesbury and her great-grandnieces, Payton and Isla Oakley.
A life-long member of the Jehovah’s Witness faith, she was a member of the Baddeck Congregation at the time of her death. Her faith gave her an unwavering hope in the resurrection and an unshakable inner peace and she remained calm and focused, even in the most difficult times of her life. Her faith was exemplary. She "pursued righteousness, godly devotion, faith, love, endurance and mildness of temper."
She was kind and considerate to others, a good neighbour and a loyal friend. She had style and grace and always knew the appropriate thing to do or say because she was so perceptive of other people’s needs. She possessed an analytical mind and lived her life with mathematical precision because she truly loved and understood math.
As a child, she excelled academically. Upon finishing high school, and being too young to be accepted into Teacher’s College, she took a secretarial diploma from Empire Business College, Sydney and a physical training certificate of qualification. She then enrolled in and graduated from the Provincial Normal College, Truro, Class of 1939 (1st Rank). She enjoyed playing basketball at PNC. She acquired additional certificates in shorthand, bookkeeping and accounting at Success Business College, Truro and a Nova Scotia Dept. of Education Primary certificate. She became certified as a business education specialist and, in the 1970s, she updated her teaching license by taking the N. S. Summer School block program.
Her teaching career took her on a diverse path: she taught as a first-year teacher in Roseburn, Inverness Co. She then was teaching vice-principal at the Empire Business College, Sydney. She taught night school at Sydney Academy and, during the Second World War, taught typing and shorthand to the Canadian Armed Forces at Victoria Park Base, Sydney. She taught a Civil Service course to train secretaries for Ottawa and service in the federal government.
She was married to Albert Chisholm of Nevada Valley on Aug. 18, 1942. When she and her husband and daughter moved to Montreal in 1947, she taught for three years at the O’Sullivan College of Business Administration. Returning to Cape Breton , she later taught in the Business Education department of Mabou Consolidated School
(1965-1971), the school from which she retired.
Helen was an avid reader and she enjoyed playing games (Jeopardy, Scrabble and Trivial Pursuit) and did countless jigsaw puzzles over the years. At the time of her death, she was still doing the daily crossword puzzle from the paper. As a young girl, she was particularly accomplished at the crafts of knitting, crochet, tatting and rug-hooking but didn’t like to sew. She enjoyed watching several sports on TV.
She enjoyed music in a variety of forms: growing up, she played 'Scotch music' on her violin and was known to be one of the neighbourhood’s best step-dancers; she also enjoyed listening to classical and pop music and really loved the ballet. She had a particular fondness for figure-skating, enjoying its skillfulness, music and artistry and had attended many live performances and competitions over 35 years. When her health prevented her from attending in person, she would avidly follow the yearly competitions through the media.
A reader and writer of poetry, one of Helen’s favourite poems by W. B. Yeats , "When You Are Old", sums up her long life, well lived:
"When you are old and gray and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your moments of glad grace;
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you
And loved … your changing face."
Visitation for Helen Chisholm will be in the Dennis Haverstock Funeral Chapel, Whycocomagh on Wednesday from 2-9 p.m. A funeral service for Helen will be held on Thursday, Aug. 20, 2015 at 2 p.m. from the funeral chapel, with Mr. Robert Lambie, overseer of the Baddeck Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses officiating. Burial will follow immediately after the service in Elmwood Cemetery, Hillsborough.
Donations in Helen’s memory may be made to the Central Inverness County Palliative Care Society, Inverness Consolidated Memorial Hospital. Since mom loved flowers, flowers are also gratefully accepted.
Words of comfort may be forwarded to the family at www.haverstocks.com.
