TRAVERSE CITY -- Mavis Miller recently cleaned her house and when she came upon her fireplace mantle, she found herself awash in memories.
Grand Traverse County resident Miller, 77, took a close look at her Silver Cup Award, now tarnished with age, and realized it was 60 years ago she won it at the Northwestern Michigan Fair with her prized Ayrshire dairy cow.
She took home plenty of ribbons in 4-H competitions over the years -- for gardening, sewing, poultry and good grooming -- but the Silver Cup for her three years of domination in the dairy cow competition stands out.
"It was a happy time. I made a lot of friends and got to meet a lot of people every year," Miller said.
The heifer was called Stylish and the animal certainly lived up to her name, winning the top award at the fair in 1946, 1947 and 1948.
The way Miller remembers it, the Rotary Club of Traverse City created the Silver Cup Award for the 4-H dairy cow competition in 1933 and decreed that anyone who took the top prize for three consecutive years got to keep it. Miller certainly did.
"I'm glad I kept it. I should take it and get it polished, I suppose," she said.
There apparently has not been another Silver Cup Award since then, Miller said.
That very well may be true, said Bob Yeiter, secretary of Traverse City's Rotary Club. He doesn't recall any such awards in recent decades.
"I'm sure it meant a lot to her in those days and probably even more now," Yeiter said, adding the club continues to support 4-H.
Miller, who lived in Alden and was named Mavis Kratochvil in the 1940s, eventually became a 4-H leader. She married in 1951 and moved downstate with her husband, Will Miller, where she worked for more than three decades sewing seat cushions at a General Motors plant.
The couple returned to northern Michigan in 1989 and lived together near Traverse City until he died more than five years ago.
Now Miller busies herself researching her family's genealogy and taking care of her large lawn, she said.
And whatever happened to the prized cow?
"Eventually, she was butchered. She got to the point where she couldn't produce any calves anymore," Miller said, a hint of regret in her voice.
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