This is how I remember Miss Stella Geraldine Graham, who was born on the 3rd December 1917, and died at the age of 96, after a very long life, filled with good works, enduring relationships with family and friends, personal goodwill to all and the respect of all who knew her:

She told me when I called her on New Year’s Eve three years ago and remarked that I heard she was unwell, that it was more than that; she had to rely on others to do everything for her. Then, she went straight to the point: “I want you to tell everyone who I was when I die.”

I told her that I didn’t think I was up to it because I, too, was at an advanced age. She replied, “It does not have to be long, just tell them who I was.” She had made up her mind and she always had a will of steel.

What she was can be summed up in one word. Stella Graham was a LADY. In all she said and did and during her lifetime, she behaved with the highest measure of nobility.

During the best years of her life, she was a civil servant. I prefer that term to the current name for those who serve the public. There were rules which had to be followed, but the good civil servant was there to be friendly and helpful. Stella was the very model of what a good civil servant’s attitude to the public should be.

Most of her career in the public service was spent in the General Post Office, where it began. While there, she performed every duty and headed every division of that department and the record of her performance could be equalled, but not surpassed.

Accuracy was her strong point. One of the most demanding jobs in the post office was cashier at G.P.O. headquarters office. Most departments’ cashiers handled two or three different transactions. Headquarters’ cashiers dealt with seven. To balance your books to the cent at the end of the day was an accomplishment. For Miss Graham, that was her normal expectation.

That she retired two years after her transfer to the Treasury Department, where she served as accountant, is due to the fact that she had a late start. Her first employment as a stamps vendor in the General Post Office, was at the age of 32 years. Had she entered the public service at eighteen or twenty, she would have ended her career as a Permanent Secretary. Her intelligence, diligence and self-discipline were recognized and admired throughout the public service.

In her private life Stella conducted herself with the highest regard for rectitude and propriety. She loved good manners in her friends and associates, who tried to measure up to the high standards of behaviour that she herself epitomized. She could not abide insincerity and if she was ever uncharitable, it may have been in her harsh criticism of persons in high places who failed to live up to their responsibility to set good examples.

She never married, so it was necessary for her to develop the virtues of independence and self-reliance to a high degree. She was very decisive and once she had made up her mind to pursue an objective, would persist in the face of all obstacles. As strong-willed as she was, you would think that her friends would be weak sisters. That was not the case. Until her death, her closest friends were ladies of like spirit and strength of character.

Stella was very devoted to her friends, family, and her religious faith. She gave glory to God by serving her fellowman with all her heart and soul during her lifetime. And now, we can hope that the Lord will welcome her into His kingdom with the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

(Ed. NOTE: This newspaper expresses maximum respect to the late Miss Stella Graham and sympathy to all her relatives and friends.)