Wilna Lee McAnerney

Wilna Lee McAnerney, 86, died peacefully at home in Wasilla on Sept. 5, 2007.

McAnerney was a businesswoman and a former Seward council member and mayor, later serving Gov. Jay Hammond’s administration in Juneau as commissioner of Community and Regional Affairs throughout two terms, leaving in 1982.

She was born at Letterman Army Hospital in San Francisco’s Presidio July 14, 1921, to Hilma Josephina Hihnala and soldier Marvyn Delbert Williams. That marriage and another failed. Her mother met McAnerney’s stepfather, Sol Urie, in 1925 in Valdez. The family traveled extensively between 1926 and 1930, including a posting in Panama and one at Fort Monmouth, N.J.

Her stepfather worked for the Washington and Alaska Military Cable System.

In 1930, the family returned to Alaska, where Urie worked as a bookkeeper and in 1931 bought a bakery. McAnerney became a baker’s assistant and short-order cook, trading that work for the cannery job. In her senior year of high school she met her future husband, John Marshall McAnerney, a mining teacher at a University of Alaska extension office and 13 years her senior. The couple married on Oct. 11, 1941, at the home of a Catholic priest, as she was a new convert to her husband’s religion.

She attended the University of Washington and John McAnerney joined the U.S. Navy in the spring of 1942, which took him to Washington, New Hampshire, Virginia, South Carolina and Florida. In 1946, they returned to Anchorage, where he taught and she became clerk of the Anchorage school system. In the fall of 1948, McAnerney left work to adopt the first of their three children, Jane, Ann and Peter. Work again prompted the family to travel Outside, but they returned in 1954 with McAnerney working for her step-father in a bar he owned.

Starting in 1957, her husband’s work took them to the Midwest and East Coast. Their marriage was cut short when John McAnerney died suddenly while on a temporary assignment in Fairbanks.

With her mother in poor health, Wilna McAnerney took over her mother’s job at her step-father’s business in 1969. In 1971, she began her political life, running for and winning a seat on Seward’s city council. She then ran for and was elected mayor in 1973, a unique accomplishment for a woman back then. Gov. Hammond called her in 1974 to serve in his administration, and during the next eight years she traveled throughout the state, country and internationally as commissioner of Community and Regional Affairs.

She served on many boards and commissions, including the University of Alaska, Fairbanks College of Fellows and chaired the Senate Select Committee on Oil and Gas Taxation.

She relocated to Seattle for a milder climate due to health issues in 1991, but returned to Anchorage in 1999 to the home of her granddaughter, Terri Lincoln, then to daughter Jane Gall’s home in Valdez. She eventually settled in Wasilla.

A tireless fundraiser for her causes, McAnerney also enjoyed opera, travel, theatre and fashion, as well as spending time with friends and family.

She is survived by daughter Jane Gall of Wasilla; son Peter McAnerney of Canada; sister Sanna (Duane) Levan of Seward; granddaughter and grandson Sarah and Chris Middlestadt; and great-grandchildren Hunter Lee Beling, Scott Glenn Berry, Samantha Suzanne Middlestadt and Hannah Jane Middlestadt of Wasilla. Other survivors include granddaughter and grandson Terri and Paul Lincoln; great-granddaughter Denali Jade Lincoln of Anchorage; niece Sue Ann and nephew Mel; and niece and nephew Judy and Ian Fulp and children.

Services begin at 1 p.m. Sept. 15 at the Sacred Heart Church in Seward. Friends attending are asked to bring a white rose. A reception in the church will immediately follow the service. Burial will be private. The family appreciates all prayers and thoughts and suggests anyone interested donate to a local Alzheimer’s Association.

Valley Funeral Homes and Crematory of Wasilla and Palmer assisted the family.