Adele Block Miller, 89, a feisty and committed woman whose sense of moral duty included finding fair rental prices for Chicagoans during World War II and volunteering for decades with a group that helped the disabled and children with cancer, died of cancer Thursday, April 11, in her Wilmette home. “She had incredible drive,” said her son Jack Block. “Her charity work was an instrumental part of her life.” She was also remarkably independent, a grandmother who tossed her walker into an ’85 Toyota for trips to symphony concerts, fundraisers and investment club meetings. Still, said her son, it was the social service work that she relished. “She always felt like it was important to try to make the world a better place than when you found it. And that was very important to her,” he said. The former Adele Siegel grew up in Hyde Park, graduated from Hyde Park High School in 1931, and worked in the federal office that regulated rental pricing before and during World War II. She married Myron Block Sr. in 1943, a few years after meeting him at a party, and they lived in South Shore and Hyde Park as they raised two sons. She worked for the University of Chicago office that found housing for faculty members in the 1960s and began volunteering with the Johanna Philanthropic Group, a Jewish women’s society that supports programs for the disabled. That volunteer work had drifted over the last 20 years toward fundraising, her son said. She served in the 1980s as president of the group, and it was during her tenure at the group’s helm that it began raising funds for Camp One Step at a Time, a retreat for child cancer patients in Lake Geneva, Wis. Her first husband died in 1976, and Mrs. Miller remarried in 1979 to Joseph Miller. They lived in Wilmette, where she remained after his death in 1983. Mrs. Miller is also survived by another son, Myron Block Jr.; and five grandchildren. A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Sunday in Beth Emet The Free Synagogue, 1224 Dempster St., Evanston.
