Born Nila Elizabeth Barton on Friday May 4, 1934 in a log cabin in Bozeman Montana, Nila left us to join Dad on July 28, 2023 at 89 in San Diego, California. Growing up in rural Montana, her father Ivan Barton was killed in a logging accident and her step father Chester Adams passed away from cancer. The daughter of Hazel Adams, an itinerate school teacher, Nila grew up learning to drive a hay wagon and earning awards as a sharp shooter along with her younger sister Elsie Joan and her two older brothers Tom and the oldest Earl. Tom passed away in a boating accident which induced fear of swimming in her she didn’t get over until she got practice in her backyard pool in Arizona. Well-liked by both students and teachers in high school, she was elected President of the Future Homemakers of America at Gallatin County High and chosen to travel to Helena, the state capital of Montana, to present the Governor with a United Nations flag. Leaving home for college at Montana State, she joined the AOII sorority and started working in the college bookstore. There she met the love of her life Milton N. Burgess, a sharp witted “big man on campus” she called him, who was a manager of the bookstore. One coffee date and he wrote his mom that he’d met the girl he was going to marry. Lucky for him and her children, she didn’t know about that note. They married in 1955 in Bozeman. She worked to support Milt as he got his engineering degree and she eventually quit college after two years of study in Home Economics. She used to say she got her PHT degree: “Putting Hubby Through.” Once Milt graduated and got his first job, they moved 6 times in 7 years having their first son, Mark, in Spokane, Washington in 1957, brother Michael in Seattle in 1959, the youngest brother back in Spokane in 1961 and their daughter Lynnette in Missoula Montana in 1964. Mom was an active member of the Deacons at the First Presbyterian Church in Missoula (the church a setting for the movie “River Runs Thought It”) as well as an officer in the United Presbyterian Women. She did bookkeeping for Dad’s plumbing business, worked in the office of a doctor in Tucson Arizona and in the Pomerado Hospital in Poway, California. In San Diego, she and Milt were members of Rancho Bernardo Community Church, Trinity Presbyterian, Fletcher Hills Presbyterian and attendees of Pt Loma Presbyterian. She always remembered and sent cards for the birthdays and anniversaries of a wide scope of her family, staying in touch with everyone, spending hours in the Hallmark store chuckling over cards. She had a quick and mischievous wit that resulted in April Fools jokes on her kids, but cared deeply for everyone. She and Milt traveled the world, sailing on the QE2 across the Atlantic and returning on the SST; visiting the Passion Play in Oberammergau Germany; vacations in Mexico and Hawaii and a cross country driving trip to Nova Scotia to chase family history. On that trip, Dad got permission to record her answers to his questions about her life which resulted in the book “Lover Never Fails” listing her as author on Amazon.com. Concerned with care for others her whole life, her family was her life, she was ready to join Dad…to “go home.”
Nila is survived by her sister Joan Hart, her children Mark(Julie), Craig(Kimmer), daughter-in-law Colette (son Michael passed in 2016), Lynnette(Mike) Garrigan, 9 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren. For details check https://aguanuevopublishing.com/2021/04/06/love-never-fails/
Graveside services will take place at 11:30 a.m. on Saturday, September 16, 2023 at Forestvale Cemetery. A service celebrating Nila’s life will follow the graveside service at 1:00 p.m. at Anderson Stevenson Wilke Funeral Home, 3750 N. Montana Ave. A reception will follow the service in the social hall of the funeral home.
Service Schedule
Celebration of Her Life
1:00 p.m.
Saturday September 16, 2023
Anderson Stevenson Wilke Funeral Home
3750 N. Montana Ave
Helena, Montana 59602
Reception
Following the Celebration of Her Life
Saturday September 16, 2023
Anderson Stevenson Wilke Funeral Home
3750 N. Montana Ave
Helena, Montana 59602
Service Schedule
Celebration of Her Life
1:00 p.m.
Saturday September 16, 2023
Anderson Stevenson Wilke Funeral Home
3750 N. Montana Ave
Helena, Montana 59602
Reception
Following the Celebration of Her Life
Saturday September 16, 2023
Anderson Stevenson Wilke Funeral Home
3750 N. Montana Ave
Helena, Montana 59602
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