Marcella Sweet

1925 - 2019

WELLSVILLE - Marcella Colburn Sweet, 93, passed away Friday (May 31, 2019) at the Hart Comfort House of Wellsville.

A lifelong resident of Wellsville, Marcella was born Dec. 17, 1925, to William and Hazel Burns Colburn, in Wellsville.

She attended the Immaculate Conception School and was a graduate of Wellsville High School.

After graduation, and while working at the First Trust Union Bank, she took a day-trip to Rushford Lake with a friend, and fell in love with a stretch of land on the north shore of Balcolm Beach, in Rushford. She went back to work the next day and told her manager, E.J. Brown, about the land, and he told her he would co-sign a loan for her so that she could buy the land. She was 20 years old.

After purchasing the land, only then did she tell her father about it and he and her uncles went to work building a cottage where the family spent summers for the next 45 years.

She also taught at the Immaculate Conception School and worked as a bookkeeper for Rockwell's Department Store, the family-run business in Wellsville.

Marcella met Paul at the Funland Roller Skating Rink, in Wellsville, just after his return from the service in World War II, and they were married April 20, 1949. She and Paul were married for nearly 50 years and raised three sons on Fassett Lane in Wellsville, just a few houses away from her parents. Paul was the love of her life. Marcella and Paul enjoyed traveling and frequenting casinos.

She was a communicant of the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church and a member of the Altar and Rosary Society, charged with keeping the church staffed during the week. She was a member of the Beta Sigma Phi Sorority, a driver for the Wellsville Volunteer Ambulance Corps and an avid card player who enjoyed playing and hosting the local bridge club.

Marcella enjoyed anything that allowed her to socialize. She loved meeting new people, making new friends and spending time with friends and family. She could make a new friend quite literally while standing in line at the grocery store and truly believed that a stranger was just a friend you hadn't yet met.

In later years she would travel around the county, sometimes four or five nights a week, to play bingo in different towns with different groups of friends.

She is survived by her daughter-in-law, Beverly (James) Sweet of Wellsville; sons, Bill (Janet Kemp) Sweet of Wellsville and Douglas Sweet of McKinney, Texas; and grandsons, Brian Sweet of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and Kevin Sweet of Las Vegas, Nev.; and several cousins.

Marcella was pre-deceased by her husband, Paul B. Sweet; and her eldest son, James P Sweet.

A Memorial Mass will be celebrated at 10 a.m. July 27, 2019 in the Immaculate Conception Church. Friends are invited to call at the church from 9 to 10 a.m. prior to the mass.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that a donation be made in her name to the Hart House, the Immaculate Conception Church, the Wellsville Volunteer Ambulance Corps or the donor's choice.

To leave online condolences, please visit embserfuneralhome.com.