Lilletta “Lettie” Lee Neuman
Lilletta “Lettie” Lee Neuman
MISSOULA – Lilletta “Lettie” Lee Neuman, age 63, of Missoula and former Polson resident, died at St. Patrick Hospital, Wednesday, May 30, 2012, surrounded by the love of her husband John, son Greg and her extended family. Lettie was an enrolled member of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribe, born July 17, 1948, the first-born child of Eugene and Faye Pitts. She was the eldest of five children.
A log home on Camas Prairie was Lettie’s family home until age three when the Pittses moved the sawmill to Ravalli and took up residence and cattle ranching in Dixon. In Lettie’s fourth year of life she was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes and began taking the relatively new treatment of the day-an insulin shot delivered in glass syringes and needles sharpened on a wet stone. Despite having a childhood illness, Lettie was a positive, happy, curly redheaded child with a quick wit and zest for life. She busied her life with school academics, honor society, cheerleading, school drama, and played the trumpet in the Dixon School Band. She became the salutatorian of her 1966 Dixon High School graduation class.
Shortly after graduation from the University of Montana with a degree in business administration, Lettie married her childhood sweetheart Johnny Neuman, July 23, 1970, whom she had met and developed a “crush on” in grade school when he moved to Dixon from Frenchtown. They resided in Dixon and Ravalli as John worked for the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs at the Dixon Agency and she began a 37-year career with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, Kicking Horse Job Corp Center, outside of Ronan. After the Agency was moved to Pablo, the Neumans relocated to Polson and began their family. Though pregnancy was very challenging for Lettie’s health, her determination produced the child of her dreams, Gregory John Neuman. Lettie loved being a mother and savored his every growing moment. Lettie’s eyes twinkled as she told stories of her son’s work career with the W Hotel in Chicago and Europe. She was and remains his best cheerleader. As a family they enjoyed remodeling several homes and oversaw the building of three. Lettie, a self-taught interior designer, had a natural ability for choosing and blending lively color to make a home and office spaces warm and cozy. She loved fashion and just before her health took a serious turn, she met her longtime friend Glenda Ingrahm in Paris, France to feast her eyes on the beauty of French design and fashion.
Lettie’s celebrated working career for the Kicking Horse Job Corp began as the center director’s secretary and eventually his administrative assistant. Given her warm personality, outgoing and friendly nature, Lettie was selected for the position of placement officer. This was a key position for to the success of the Kicking Horse Center, which received national recognition numerous times for excellence. In this position Lettie traveled to many of the reservations in the nation, bringing information about the center, recruiting and matching Native American students with a career path, assisting families to adjust to sending their young adults so far from home, counseling students through stages of homesickness and as well as holding their hands during rough times when they might learn of a family member’s illness or death. Yes, Lettie was a mother to each and every student she came to know. Eventually, Lettie retired from Kicking Horse, easing into retirement in 2006.
Over the course of Lettie’s life, if you asked her about the Lord, her response was “I talk to him every day.” Given her and her family’s health challenges she relied on her knowledge of heaven to live through each day.
Lettie was preceded in death by her father, Eugene Pitts (February 2011); brother Larry Pitts (November 2009), whom also died from complications of diabetes; mother-in-law Josephine “Joey” Neuman; father-in-law Orin Neuman; and beloved poodle “Fancy Pants.”
Survivors include her husband, John Neuman of Missoula; son Greg Neuman of Chicago; mother Faye Pitts of Dixon; brother Garry (Christine) Pitts of Polson; brother Terry (Crystal) Pitts of Dixon; sister KoLynn (Paul) Sinclair of Yakima, Wash. and Polson; sister-in-law Ginger Pitts of Polson; brother-in-law Danny (Rita) Neuman of Billings; sister-in-law Gail (Gordon) Fyant of Polson; Darlene (Hawk) of Evaro; Marlene of Oakland; Monica of Pablo; Tina (Moose) of Richland; and many nieces and nephews, (whom Lettie was a staunch supporter of their many activities in life), as well as her great-nieces and nephews.
Services have been held.
The Neuman family would like to thank the staff of St. Patrick Hospital, and friends of the valley for the many calls of support and emails.
