This Memorial website was created in the memory of our loved one, Janice Knowlton who was born in Massachusetts on January 08, 1937 & passed away on March 05, 2004 at the age of 67. We will remember her forever. This memorial contains her truth as she knew it  

ATTENTION: Barry, who met Janice once at Disneyland and who posted about her and the Horseshoe Review and about Grad Nite. Please contact me via this site. I would love to have a copy of Janice's page from the OCC yearbook if you can do that for me. I just happened to find your comments on line. I was so upset after losing Janice that I don't remember that we emailed. I don't even still have your email address.

Thank you for your kind words about Janice. She was dismissed as a kook by many who never knew the real Jan, a kind and compassionate person, but you recognized that about her.                    

ATTENTION: Bree, (Berenice Sanchez McKenna - Jan's penpal in the Army) Please contact me by way of this site. I moved and my snail & emails come back undeliverable. PS, Bree, I've moved from where
you wrote to me before. I finally discovered your email address on this site but my email came back undeliverable~
                                                 
                                         ~  About Janice ~

 She was born in Beverly, MA and raised in New England and California. She graduated from Beverly High School class of 1954 and attended Orange Coast College in Orange County, CA. 

  She was a professional singer who trained for the Metropolitan opera in New York City in the late 1950's. She sang at the Viennese Lantern  in Manhattan and appeared in several musical comedys at the Cape Cod Melody Tent in Hyannis, MA in the earlly 60's.

  She moved back to Orange County, California in August 1969 and stayed there until October when she moved to San Francisco. In San Francisco she met and married Bart Sandberg and they lived there and then in Portland, Oregon. The marriage broke up in April 1973 and she moved back to Orange County finding work as a secretary at Disneyland in late July 1973.

  She appeared  with  the  Disneyland   Players in their  production  of The Sound of Music  as  the  mother superior. Each time she hit a high C she received a standing ovation from each and every audience  member who attended each of the productions. 

  She  danced in The Horseshoe Review for several  seasons.  Janice  also appeared in  The Long Beach Civic Light Opera  and  at  The Forum Theater at California State University in Fullerton where she entertained many times. She appeared on stage there with Comic George Gobel in 1985.  

 She sang for a number of years at the former Mario's Italian Dinner Restaurant in Corona Del Mar  and  The Five Crowns Dinner Restaurant  with  The Showcase Singers,  a  group which she helped  found and which continues.  

  She owned and operated a public relations business for many years in Orange County and performed with Broadway Plus and  pianists Betty Wooldridge and  Don Chatfield . She was a published poet  and writer. 

 She was a fine artist,  turning out many  beautiful oil paintings and pen and ink drawings over the years. She co-wrote Daddy Was The Black Dahlia Killer with Mike Newton . She was a generous,  kind and loving individual and also was a humanitarian who sang to raise money for various causes, such as HAWC and The Humane  Society  in  Orange  County.   

 She had a large family and many friends whom she treated as family and a cat named Suki. She leaves her brother Garry, sisters Marilyn, Beverly, Jolane, Donna  and Melody,  cousins Gail, Ronnie, Larry, Mary, Chris and Kenny, Brenda, Joyce Richard and many other family members and friends which include  Joan Bergeron, Alma and Bill De Smith, Linnea Freeman, Ellie Rosenbaum, LLoyd Battista, Laurie Jacobson,  T.C. Paulinkonis, the late Marianne Prokop Bagg, Michael Newton, Yvonne Hyatt, Shirley Hyatt, Mary Rabkin & Eli Rabkin, Florence Rothmel, Joan Noble Pinkham, Michelle Koldsbaek, Robin Berg,  Jacque De River - Daniel, Her former husband Bart Sandberg, * a daughter Judith who was adopted out as an infant,  cousins Don and Ray Goucher,  her godchild Kayla Smith, Arlene & son Barry Solomon and numerous other friends and family members. 

 She was predeceased  by her parents George and Marjorie Knowlton, a stepmother Kathleen, * a daughter Lily and son Vincent, a brother Kevin, and sisters Midgie and Sandra,  Interment was in the Westminster Memorial Park in Westminster California.

                                                   ~

 Before she died Janice told a friend by email that she believed she would have to have her cat put down because her cat had chronic kidney infections. She told a friend living close by that she believed she would have to have her cat put down because she may have to be hospitalized for depression. [This friend told me that Janice's cat was not ill with chronic kidney infections and so Janice obviously told her email friend in Oregon a falsehood]  She believed her cat couldn't live without her. She told one email friend that she was frightened and hanging by a thread due to depression. She said she may also hav to have her cat euthanized.  ALSO?. What did she mean by this, In addition to what ? In addition to uthanizing herself ?  This after writing that she would  have to have her cat put down, after writing that she was frightened by depression and panic attacks and hanging on by a thread.
She told different stories to different people. She refused to stay over at any one of three friends homes and she refused to be taken to the mental hospital facility by EMTs when she desperately phoned her psychiatrist's fill in for help. She wasn't able to reason clearly. She decided to end her life but not to let anyone know what she was about to do. She didn't want anyone to stop her. I don't WANT to believe she deliberately killed herself, but I have no choice. There is too much evidence to the contrary.

 Donations may be made in her memory to  The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention120 Wall Street, 22nd floor, New York, NY 10005, HELP FOR ABUSED WOMEN AND THEIR CHILDREN [HAWC] in Massachusetts  or to whichever other title is used in CA or in your area or to The Humane Society of Orange County, CA, or to the one in your area, or to Childrens Hospital in Orange County.

* Janice believed that she gave birth to three children as a young teenager but there is no concrete evidence that these births occurred. Janice  believed that she repressed memories of many events.


                               ~    Her Beautiful poem  ~

    I Have Willed This House To You

    I  walked into a house one day 
    Where lived a friend of mine.
    Called to him, searched for him,
    Then waited for a time.
    After a while, tried and bored,
    Impatient with the wait,
    I stood to leave, quite certain that
    he had confused the date. 
    On a table by the door I saw a
    note addressed to me. It said; 
    
  " Dear Friend, I had to leave, my Dad
     has called me home.
     I promised him that I'd obey when
     He first let me roam,
     It saddens me That I can't spend the years
     ahead right here.
     We've learned from one another and
     I'll miss you that is clear.
     The meals we've shared together, 
     The laughter and the tears,
     The plans we've made are yours now
     But dear one have no fears.
     I'm richer now than when we met.
     I hope you're richer too.
     Perhaps this will bring you comfort,
     I have willed this house to you."

     I sat there stunned and thought about
     this message given me.
     I knew my friend was burdened and had
     longed to be set free.
     But how I ached to be with him,
     traveling by my side,
     Until my life was over and my
     last breath was sighed.
     Instead He'd gone and left me.
     His father's call was strong.
     Could the friend that I called brother have
     been Jesus all along ?
     I read the note again.

   " Dear friend I had to leave, My Dad
      has called Me home.
      I promised him that I'd obey
      when he first let me roam.
      It saddens me that I can't spend
      the years ahead right here.
      We've learned from one another and
      I'll  miss you,  that is clear. 
      The meals we've shared together,
      the laughter and the tears,
      The plans we've made are your's now
      but, dear one have no fears.
      I'm richer now than when we met.
      I hope you're richer too.
      Perhaps this will bring you comfort,
      I have willed this house to you."
 
       _ Janice G. Knowlton

                                   Is this a Christmas miracle?

  Just before Christmas 2008 I sketched an 18'' by ''24 canvas from a slide throwing an image of Bellini's JESUS CARRYING THE CROSS onto it
My art professor came into the room and pointed out - to my amazement -  that I had scribbled the word, ROAM in Jesus's hair. I remembered that the word, ROAM repeats itself twice in Janice's poem titled, I HAVE WILLED THIS HOUSE TO YOU. I've posted photos of the entire canvas as well as a closeup of the word, ROAM on this site. 12/04, 2008

                          OTHER POETRY BY JANICE KNOWLTON                                                        ~

                          Stray Cats

                          The Value of Stray Cats

                          (or, Explaining Chronic Fatigue)

                            Some
                            days
                            if
                            there
                            were
                            not
                            strays
                            to
                            be
                            fed

                            I
                            wouldn't
                            get
                            out
                            of
                            bed

                            Can
                            you
                            get
                            that
                            through
                            your
                            head?

                            Janice Knowlton 12/11/99

                                              ~

                                          LOVE

                       Imbibe:  to absorb or take in...

                       Love cannot be described

                       It can only be imbibed.

                                           HIC!

                    written in February 2004 shortly before
                    Janice's death on March 5, 2004
                     
                                               ~

                                         Anhedonia
                                         

                                         Anhedonia,
                                         You have goan-ee-yah
                                         Why you came to me
                                         Is a mystery

                                         Something in my brain?
                                         P'Raps it was a sprain?
                                         I may never know
                                         Why you come and go

                                         Hedonism now
                                         Is my sacred cow
                                         May it stay with me
                                         'Til I'm ninety-three

                                         All the lights are on
                                         my depression's gone,
                                         You see it in my eyes,
                                         and my increased size

                                         Appetite's returned
                                         No dessert is spurned
                                         Anhedonia,
                                         Don't return. EEE-YAH!!!

                 Anhedonia means clinical depression.
                 Janice's depression returned again with
                 a vengeance and she died soon
                 after she wrote this.

                                                  ~

                                       Candle On The Water

               This is a time to be a light shining forth
               from the shore,
               instead of being swallowed by the
               sea.

               A time to step aside nursing my own
               wounds,
               instead of plunging in where I would be
               another drowning victim joining all the
               others lost forever on the ocean
               floor.

               There's a time to be a lighthouse showing 
               by example one can finally reach the exit
               door,

               The exit from the hell we lived in all those
               years,
               an entrance to a better life on
               earth.

               The door that I passed through can open
               up for you,  and everything it cost me 
           
                    it
    
                         was

                                 worth!

                                                   ~

      The following is for J.F.K. Jr, his wife and her sister In Memorium

                                  ~  Fly Home Children ~

                                       Fly home children
                                   Fly straight home now

                                   In the ocean of this life
                                        We never met.
                                    And now you've left
                                     And I'm still here.

                                       Others I've met
                                       Others I've lost
                                       Others I've loved
                                Have flown home before you.

                                  No womb could keep you
                                  No human could save you
                                   No machine sustain you
                                   No ocean imprison you

                                   Rise up from the water
                                        Dry your wings
                                   Antennae to the light
                                      Fly home children

                                I await my own flight home
                                          Missing you
                                         Mourning you
                                   I stay but you must go

                                      Fly home children
                                   Fly straight home now

                                _ Janice Knowlton, 1999

                                                 ,,,,

                             Close enough is good enough,

                             better than good enough, it's perfect.

                             That's what I tell myself now,

                             as I take up a paintbrush,

                             a felt tip coloring pen and begin creating.

                             No more ''works of art,''

                             the word ''work'' stops me cold.

                             So I uncap a pen and start drawing,

                             sometimes with left hand, sometimes with right.

                             And the creation is not a ''finished product,''

                             but close enough that's good enough...

                                          - Oct. 3, 1999

                       
                                                   and

                                     Pack Rat People and
                                 other of her poems can be
                               viewed on this site under the
                              title called ''HER LEGACY"...........