Merrill Bothamley, 77, died peacefully of natural causes at Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach, CA on Jan. 5, 2001. He was born and raised in Long Beach, the son of Canadian immigrants, Albert and Beatrice Bothamley, who owned the Bothamley Music House on East State Street in Long Beach. Merrill excelled at debate and in 1940 was valedictorian of his graduating class at Long Beach Polytechnic Senior High School. He attended the University of Southern California, where he joined the Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, he enlisted in the Navy, which sent him to Park College in Parkville, Missouri, where he was salutatorian of his graduating class. He then studied at the Harvard Graduate School of Business and attained the rank of Ensign in the Navy Supply Corps. In April of 1945, he married Patricia Rankin in Boston, MA. After the war, they moved to Santa Ana, CA to help Patricia’s father, whose health was failing, with the family department store, Rankin Dry Goods Company. Upon the death of Herbert Rankin in 1947, when Merrill was only 24, he became General Manager of Rankin’s, which was still the largest department store between Los Angeles and San Diego. His professional career eventually led him to investment banking, first in Los Angeles and later in Chicago, where he specialized in mergers and acquisitions as a Vice President of Continental Illinois National Bank & Trust Co. of Chicago and First National Bank of Chicago and then as a principal of MidAmerica Financial Services Corporation. Merrill was a collector of coins issued during the Mexican Revolution, U.S. Parcel Post stamps and business history books. In 1976 he co-authored the book “Mexican Revolutionary Coinage 1913-1917” and later became a charter member of the Founder’s Society of Bradley University in recognition of his donation of a business history collection to the Cullom-Davis Library. He returned to his native California for his retirement years. He is survived by his wife, Patricia, who now resides in La Jolla, CA; their five children, Elizabeth Rex of Crestwood, NY, William of Jamul, CA, Robert of Rancho Palos Verdes, CA, James of Dallas, TX and Julie of Santa Monica, CA; 12 grandchildren; and his sister, Ilva Clark of Los Alamitos, CA. He will be greatly missed by all. Private services were held. Arrangements by Pacific View Mortuary.
