William Miller died at Paoli Memorial Hospital in Paoli, PA on Thursday, November 12, 2020. He was born in Media, PA on February 12, 1927, to the late William Miller and Pearl Hartenstine Miller and is survived by his wife Bonnie Lee, his brother Wayne and his children Brad, Evan, Robert. In addition to his parents, he was predeceased by siblings, Patricia Miller and Warren Miller, and son, David Miller.
Bill grew up with a great wit and a big smile in Broomall and at Marple Newtown High School, he was a sports fanatic where he led his softball team and where he was consistently voted the most valuable player. He was even magical on the bowling floor too, always serving up 300 bowling scores, much to his teammates’ dismay.
It was during this time he began his love of golf, which would be a lifetime of playing courses until just last year in 2019. They say that golf is the game that most closely mirrors life. Bobby Jones, one of the most influential figures in the sport and who co-founded the masters once said, “Golf is the closest game to the game we call life. You get bad breaks from good shots; you get good breaks from bad shots; but you have to play the ball where it lies.” And no one knows this better than his family that this is how Bill lived the game of life – well, except maybe his lifelong golfing buddies. Bob MacLaughlin, Dink MacLaughlin, along with Kevin DePaul. These “boys” played with Bill for decades and served it up on the many golf courses – who knows how many ways they leaned on each other in this great game of life – and golf.
Bill, even as a child, was serving his community by being a safety all through grade school. At the age of 17, Bill would continue serving during World War II in Germany where he was responsible for navigating the ground war in an armored vehicle and he remained there until the close of the war. When he returned home to some sort of normalcy, he began working at MacLaren Oil and Heat, where he was the first employee and the last, working over 45 years of dedicated service to the same company. And during his lunch time on most days, he had lunch at Tony’s Hoagie Store.
Bill would then meet his lifetime partner, Bonnie Lee Miller as she worked next door at Larchmont Pharmacy, to help pay for her college. One day in the summer of 1956, they both sat at the lunch counter together and from then on would meet every day to have lunch together for weeks and months to come. Four years later in 1960, Bonnie Lee and Bill engaged and then got married. Their social activities included travels abroad and many social gatherings with all of their friends in West Chester, Media and Broomall. They were always surrounded by love and friends and family and would have two children who are survivors– Wesley Evan Miller and William Braden Miller along with his wife Shannon and their children: Peyton Elise Miller, Owen Campbell Miller and Addison Grace Miller. Other survivors include his son Robert Miller and wife Lorena; and his daughter Nancy Miller Sargent and husband David.
Relatives and friends are invited to his Visitation on Thursday, November 19, 2020 from 10:30 am - 11:45 am at DellaVecchia, Reilly, Smith & Boyd Funeral Home, Inc., 410 North Church Street, West Chester, PA 19380, DellaFH.com; followed by his Funeral Service at 12:00 pm at the funeral home. An Interment will be held for the family directly following the Funeral Service at Philadelphia Memorial Park in Frazer, PA.
Flowers may be sent or contributions may be made to the Tunnel to Towers Foundation who honors the sacrifice of firefighter Stephen Siller who laid down his life to save others on September 11, 2001, as well as honors our military and first responders who continue to make the supreme sacrifice of life and limb for our country (https://tunnel2towers.org/). Alternatively, you send a contribution to St. Jude’s Memorial Fund (http://www.stjude.org). Kindly note in memory of William Miller.
Arrangements by DellaVecchia, Reilly, Smith & Boyd Funeral Home, Inc. of West Chester, PA 610-696-1181; www.DellaFH.com.