Joanne Marie Pellissier died Dec. 18 in Walnut Creek. She was born May 20, 1925 in Upland and raised on a ranch in Chino where she learned how to fish, hunt and milk cows.

She attended Mills College and devoted many summers as a counselor to a Girl Scout camp near Yosemite.

In 1950 she moved to Merced to teach physical education then moved back to Oakland a few years later to teach math at Oakland High School for nearly 20 years.

She loved fishing and spent some of her retirement on a houseboat on the Delta. She moved to Rossmoor in the late 1990s.

She is survived by her brothers, Leon, Henri and Francois.