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Letter to the editor

Kindergarteners were her life

Ann Brown Miller 1921-2007

By MARTY CLEAR, Times Correspondent
Published December 28, 2007

Over the course of 30 years, Ann Brown Miller was the very first schoolteacher that hundreds of South Tampa children ever knew.

Mrs. Miller taught kindergarten for more than 30 years as the director of Manhattan Avenue United Methodist Church Day School. She also served as the school's director.

She passed away Dec. 14 after several years of declining health.

Her love of teaching and her dedication to children led at least one other person to choose a career in education.

"She taught kindergarten for 30 years, and I'm in my 30th year, so she definitely was an inspiration to me," said her daughter, Cathy Grace, a second-grade teacher in North Carolina.

Ann Brown grew up in Montgomery, W.Va., where coal mining was the predominant industry. She married a miner named Everette Miller and they started to raise their son and daughter in their hometown.

A pioneering spirit and a bit of perspicacity led the family to Tampa in the early 1950s.

"My father had the foresight to realize that he didn't want to raise his family in Appalachia," said their son, David Miller. "He knew there was something better. So even though he had work in West Virginia, he moved the family to Florida without even having any job prospects."

Everette Miller recognized that Florida was on the verge of a population boom and that economic prosperity would follow, David Miller said.

But neither of the Miller children was sure why their father chose Tampa. Perhaps Mrs. Miller had gotten to know the city during the World War II years, while her husband was in the military and she took a job as a chauffeur for various Army Air Corps generals. But they may have chosen Tampa at random.

Whatever the reason, the Millers settled in South Tampa. They rented a house for a while, then built a new house right down the street, which became the family home for more than a half century.

David Miller bought the house and moved into it after his father passed away and his mother moved into the Grand Court on Bayshore several years ago.

Almost immediately after they came here, Mrs. Miller took a job with Manhattan Avenue United Methodist Church Day School, just a few blocks away from her home, and continued to work there until she retired in the 1980s. It was the only job she held during her years in Tampa.

Her husband found work as an auto mechanic, and later opened his own service station at Manhattan Avenue and Henderson Boulevard, which he operated for many years.

As a teacher and administrator, Mrs. Miller was popular with both students and parents.

"She has several second-generation students," David Miller said.

"She'd teach the kids, and when they grew up their own kids would be in her classroom."

The key to Mrs. Miller's success and popularity as a teacher, Grace said, was that she respected her students enough to allow them to be kids while she started to prepare them for the academic careers. The kids loved being in her classroom, and after they had grown, they sent their own sons and daughters to her because of the guidance she offered.

"She was firm, but she wanted them to enjoy kindergarten," Grace said. "So they always had fun, but at the same time they knew what their limits were."

Besides her son and daughter, Mrs. Miller is survived by four grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.

[Last modified December 27, 2007, 07:42:55]