Juanita Zoe Smoot Fletcher

After a long and wonderful life filled with family, friends and community, Juanita Zoe Smoot Fletcher passed away on June 23, 2020. Her life started in Willow, Oklahoma on October 22, 1931, when she was born fifth in a family of eight to William Stonner Smoot and Jane Virginia (Hood) Smoot. Their farmhouse was small, but full of love, and all eight children grew into successful adults, most of whom never left Oklahoma. Iris Odell, Alvah Leo, William Stonner Jr., Thomas Morris, Juanita Zoe, Wanda Faye, Delmar Wayne and Loretta Jane were raised knowing that family comes first. They went to school, church, and community functions with many Smoot and Hood cousins, friends and neighbors. Juanita left home at eighteen to attend business college, then went on to marry, and spend most of her life in California, but her family and Willow were never far from her mind. She kept in touch with siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews throughout her life, and gathered photos and family history which she organized, duplicated and shared with everyone. For 40 years, with her sister Wanda and later her daughters, she remotely planned, and then traveled to attend an annual Easter Smoot-Hood Family Reunion in Willow. Juanita was a 1949 graduate of Ocina School (grades 1-12), and nearly every year for 50 years she traveled home to attend her school reunion. Her last reunion trip to visit classmates and cousins was in September 2017. Her children, Paula Ann Danner Montanez (Eugene), Michael Allen Danner (Wanda) and Kathy Lynn Danner Strader (Charlie) have all inherited Juanita's attachment to family and to Willow, a frequent family vacation destination. With her first husband, Lewis Danner, a California native, Juanita lived in Texas, Michigan, California and then back to Willow, Oklahoma with her small children when the Air Force sent Lewis overseas. After the Air Force, the family ultimately relocated to Hemet, California in 1965, and then Corona in 1969, which became their hometown, where all three children graduated from Corona High School in the 1970's. Juanita became a grandmother in 1981 when Robert Montanez and Jennifer Danner Richardson were born, followed by Amanda Danner in 1983, Rachel Danner Gov in 1985 and Sarah Danner in 1996, and then great-grandmother to Michael and Mara Richardson, Royce and Archer Montanez and James Gov. Juanita enjoyed gardening, country music and square dancing, and during her single years in the 1980's she met Henry Fletcher, also an avid square dancer. They married in 1989, and lived in Mira Loma for thirty years, where he still resides. During her last two years, Juanita was cared for by the wonderful staff at Brookdale Memory Care and Brookdale Hospice in Corona. Juanita was always known for her calm nature, level head and ability to get the job done. After moving to California, with all three kids in school, she worked as an Emergency Room admissions clerk and an ambulance dispatcher, then from 1970 until her second retirement at age 75, she worked as a customer service and shipping clerk for clay pipe and roofing tile manufacturers in the Corona area. She became lifelong friends with co-workers Joyce Pavkov Reynolds and Dovie Lyons, as they shared years of work, life and child-rearing, and then enjoyed their well-deserved retirement years together, too. Juanita will be missed every day by her family, but her legacy of family first and her love of Willow, Oklahoma will live on. She is survived by her three children, five grandchildren, five great-grandchildren, her husband Hank, sister Loretta Drake of Elk City, OK, sister-in-law Sue Smoot of Elk City, and many cousins, nieces and nephews. In the coming months, when travel is less restricted, Juanita will take one more trip to Oklahoma. Her ashes will be interred with her parents and siblings at the Willow Cemetery, and a Celebration of Life will be held in her honor at the Willow Community Building. Donations in her honor may be made to Alzheimer's Assoc. Inland Empire at http://act.alz.org/goto/JuanitaZoe or the Methodist Church in Willow, Oklahoma.