Margarita Miner

Margarita L. Miner, of North Tonawanda died Sunday May 17, 2009 in Canterbury Woods Nursing Facility at age 99. She had lived on Pinewoods Drive in North Tonawanda for nearly sixty years. Born in Bayamon, Puerto Rico on July 21,1909, the former Margarita Leonhardt was the widow of Dr. G. Norris Miner, a prominent North Tonawanda physician for forty years who died in 1976. She was the daughter of Dr. Heinrich C. Leonhardt, also a well-known North Tonawanda physician with offices on Goundry Street for many years, and the former Matilda Mayle of Niagara Falls. She had lived in North Tonawanda since the age of twelve, when she and her parents returned to North Tonawanda after a number of years in Puerto Rico. Mrs. Miner is survived by four children, M. Bruce Miner (Sandra) of Sarasota, Florida; Marcia M. Poleon (Gerald) of Getzville, New York; George N. Miner, Jr. (Audrey) of Lockport, New York and Gail M. Easley of Clay, Kentucky. She is also survived by eight grandchildren, seven great grandchildren, and her beloved dog “Heidi”, the last of many Daschunds she owned over the last forty years. Mrs. Miner was a member of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church of the Tonawandas all of her life. She was valedictorian of the North Tonawanda High School class of 1928, attended Elmira College and was a 1932 graduate of Syracuse University. She was also a member of the Syracuse Alumni Club of Buffalo and the College Club of Buffalo. Since her husband’s death and the marriages of her children, she lived alone and rather quietly at her home, enjoying frequent visits from her children and grandchildren, tending her vegetable garden in the summer, canning fruits and vegetables, baking her wonderful Parker House rolls and making her journeys to the Muskoka Lakes region of Ontario, Canada which she visited nearly every year of her life. It was not until after her 95th birthday that her health no longer permitted her to live in her North Tonawanda home. The family will receive visitors Wednesday at Brunner Funeral Home, 156 Robinson Street, North Tonawanda, from 2:00 to 4:00 and 7:00 to 9:00. Services will be held Thursday at 10:30 at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church at Payne Avenue and Tremont Streets in North Tonawanda.. Burial to follow in Acacia Park Cemetery.