Obituaries

Milena Howard
Milena Howard passed away Feb. 25, 2010, at age 92. She was born at home on Palisades Road, Calistoga, on July 23, 1917. She was the last remaining child, the fifth child of six children, born to Domenico and Gilda Barberis, who were Italian immigrants. She lived in Calistoga all her life and graduated from Calistoga High School in 1935. Upon graduation she was awarded a lifetime membership in the California Scholarship Federation.

Shirley Hume Gaylord
Shirley Hume Gaylord, born in Alameda in 1926, died Monday, Jan. 18, 2010, at Mercy San Juan Medical Center, in Carmichael. She and her husband Bill, a St. Helena native, married in 1946 and lived in St. Helena where they both worked for the St. Helena Star. When Bill went to work for the Sacramento Bee, they moved to Sacramento in 1951. After raising two children, they opened a gift shop, Gaylord’s Mercantile, in Old Sacramento in 1970. They operated it for 19 years, retiring in 1989.

Armando McCormick Sr.
Armando Antonio McCormick Sr. was born April 13, 1924, in Santa Marta, Cienega, Colombia, to Juan and Rosa Maria (Mendoza) McCormick. He passed away on Feb. 15, 2010, at the age of 85, at his home in Napa.

Harry Sorenson
Harry Sorenson lived with his wife Margaret (“Megs”) in Calistoga for 37 years. Harry’s Calistoga years are notable for his building their adobe brick home (which he once described as his five-year project in its 13th year); for being a work buddy to others who had maintenance or building or transporting tasks (how many people did he help move?); for his service as a founding elder and Sunday School teacher in Highlands Christian Fellowship; for his abundant hospitality and devotion to family and friends; and for his planting and gardening.

Donald McComber
Donald Haskell McComber passed away peacefully at his home in Oakville, on Friday, Feb. 26, 2010, after living a full life with pancreatic cancer for five-and-a-half years. As she has been throughout, his loving wife, Mary Ann McGuire, was at his side.

Joseph Craven
Joe Craven died peacefully at St. Helena Hospital on Feb. 15, 2010. He was born Nov. 11, 1935, in Denver, Colo.