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Lee Miller, early Cedar Mill resident, turns 100
By Virginia Bruce

Earlier this summer, a birthday tea party was held at Villa Maria, a cottage on the grounds of The Sisters of St. Mary’s of Oregon campus in Beaverton. The guest of honor was Leone Sophie (Blatter) Miller, better known as Lee. She was born 100 years ago and lived her early life in Cedar Mill.

She is the great aunt of Ed Blatter, co-owner with his wife, Deby Barnhart, of the Cornell Farm Nursery on SW Barnes Road. The business is located on the site of the family farm where Lee spent her childhood. Her younger brother, Ted Blatter, lived there until his death in 2009.

The family’s first home in Cedar Mill was a small wood house on Cornell near Barnes, next to the Foege Garage. She remembers the shoemaker (Florion Osterhammer) whose shop was across the street. He lived in a single room above the shop, and was a favorite of the local children because he let them run the treadle on his big sewing machine, and was happy to repair their torn baseballs and mitts.

In 1926, the family moved to the large farmhouse where the nursery is now. As a child, she worked hard on the family farm, where they raised chickens, cows and goats. “We kept chickens for a year or two, and then an infection called coccidiosis spread and all the chicken farmers went broke,” she recalls. Eventually, the family business focused on the goat dairy. They delivered their goat milk to Portland. “Whenever someone delivered milk to Portland, they would bring back groceries, because the little store in Cedar Mill didn’t have much,” she recalls.

One cold morning, at the age of 11, she was in the milkhouse, waiting for the steam to build up in the wood-fired boiler so she could wash the bottles. She was standing near the boiler for the warmth, whiling away the time by drawing on the boiler with a pencil, when her dress caught fire! (Her mother didn’t believe in pants for girls, even while doing farm chores.) The fire spread, but both Lee’s dress and the milkhouse were quickly extinguished by her older brother Bill.

In addition to the dairy work, she helped with gardening and canning. The family had an icebox, but a lot of food, including meat, was canned during the summer so the family would have food during the winter. Gardening was a necessity, not a hobby, in those days.

She is the third oldest of six children. Her older sister Emily was favored by their father, so Lee had to do an extra share of the work. She recalls that her brother Bill got a bicycle, and all six siblings had to share it. Mostly they had to walk when they wanted to go anywhere, including up to Mt. Calvary Cemetery to catch the bus to go to high school and downtown. She and neighbor Joe Peterkort walked together nearly every school day to catch that bus.

The children went to the old Swedeville School, in a building that is still standing across the street from the Farm on Leahy Road near the corner of Barnes, until it was replaced by Tualatin View School. The building is currently used by Oregon College of Art & Craft. Lee earned $5 per week doing janitor work at the school. Neighbor children included Joe Peterkort, Don Leahy, and Alfred Teufel, all familiar names in Cedar Mill. 

Later, she attended Girls Poly, a trade school located in the current Albertina Kerr building in NE Portland. She studied business and sewing, and recalls a teacher evaluation of her work that said, “Effort 100%, accomplishment 0!”

She married Ivan Miller, who worked as a telephone installer. “Marriage was a relief,” she said. “I was only working for one man, instead of for a whole farm!” They moved to an apartment in downtown SW Portland, and later moved to Milwaukie. Lee had two daughters and a son. Lorraine lives in Phoenix and is an organist. Her other daughter Alice (Sister John Therese) is a nun at St. Mary’s in Beaverton. Howard has been driving a school bus for the last five years, after retiring after 48 years as a truck driver.

Lee ran Miller’s Grocery in Milwaukie for about five years, working 9 am-10 pm, seven days a week.  She had one employee, and her daughter Alice would help after school until closing, while Lorraine would cook dinner at home. The store operated until the landlord refused to draw up a lease so they could remodel their successful store.

After the grocery closed, Lee took a job as a clerk at the Olds & King department store in downtown Portland, and was shortly promoted to buyer of women’s wear. Before long, she was hired by a successful clothing sales company and became a national sales representative for a lingerie company.  She criss-crossed the country for about five years, giving sales presentations and store meetings.    

Finally, she decided to open her own lingerie shop in Portland, called The Leisure Trunk. She opened stores in Washington Square, John’s Landing, and Clackamas. The John’s Landing store was open for ten years. Quite a journey from the goat farm in Swedeville!

She now lives in an assisted living home in Beaverton. She still has some of the lingerie she sold hanging in her closet—lovely, well-made satin items. And she still has her sense of style!

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