Adela Lara of Santa Ana died quietly in her sleep, the morning of May 12, 2022, at a nursing facility. This past March was Adela’s 95th birthday.
Her parents were Francisco Lara of Rosales Chihuahua, Mexico, born in 1884, and Josefa Lopez born February 28, 1898, in Pecos, Texas, and of their 13 children she was the 7th daughter of 10 sisters and 3 brothers.
Adela was born in Anthony, New Mexico, and is preceded in death by twin sisters Anita and Adela at birth, Anita Rivera, Augustine, Santiago, Florina, Manuela (Nellie) Dromgoole, Juanita (Jane), and Josephine Boyd. She is survived by Mary Schimmel, Jose Lara, and Estela Zapp.
Adela completed 8 years of school, she never married and worked various jobs until employed and retired from manufacturing production. Adela and her family after her father’s death moved from where they lived for many years in El Paso, Texas, at Cyprus Street, to Southern California. This migration to California was the start of a good 4 to 5 decades of family gatherings. It was fun times for the large extended and growing Lara family; for their children, their children’s children, nephews, nieces, grandchildren - Eddie, Andrea, Auston, Otto, Nikolaus John, Justin Michael, Kimberly Ann, Linda, Austin, Taylor, William, Paul Jr., Frank and Patricia Johnston, Teresa Johnston, Nathan Johnston with Amy – to name a few and surely omit many special ones and others; gathering eating carne asada and other Mexican food, telling stories. All of this now with the passing of another of the original 13 children, confronts the family with obvious closing chapters being written of a bygone era, that the family has been blessed to have in its experience and memories. The family tree continues, but it is just different, California is different, and Adela’s quiet, longs-lasting presence now silent - is missed.
Adela has lived at her Santa Ana residence since 1966, along with others in family, her mother Josefa, and sisters Florina, Junita, and Estela. Adela and her sister Josie lived their last years together from 2019 to this year. Adela’s mind and memory were sharp to the end. She was considered one of the family’s historians, the one to go to with questions of events, dates, and history; or for help to identify who the persons are in those black and white pictures, stored in so many boxes and closets that get pulled out and reviewed on special occasions. Adela one day reflecting on her long life, concluded that maybe one of the reasons she lived so long was to ensure that the family-tree going back a good 125-years was somewhat correct and not forgotten.
Adela enjoyed and remembered many of the accounts in the Bible and always expressed in a humble and reverent way her faith in God and His son Jesus Christ. The conclusion of her prayers, her AMENS, were expressively meaningful and significant when she would say in a rote and repetitive way - “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit – GRACE AND PEACE.”
2 Peter 1:2
Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
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