(Butler, PA) Glenn T. Miller’s handle on a citizens band radio as a sixth-grader was “The Pioneer,” recalls longtime friend, former CB enthusiast and fellow Butler County Community College trustee Brian “The Striped Tomato” McCafferty.

Miller’s choice of a pseudonym may have had to do more with a brand of chainsaws in the mid-1970s, McCafferty said, than in foretelling whom and what Miller would become.

After graduating from Moniteau Junior-Senior High School in West Sunbury, Miller enrolled at BC3, earned an associate in arts degree in 1981, worked with three other graduates to help form the college’s Alumni Association in 1997 and began service as a BC3 trustee in 1998.

“He chose BC3 to start his college education,” McCafferty said. “You talk about becoming a Pioneer. He was then a trustee for almost half the life of the college. We’re celebrating the college’s 60th anniversary, and he had been on the board for 28 years.

“It’s incredible when you think about the coincidence of his handle.”

Miller, of Butler, who as a teenager with McCafferty would watch weekly episodes of “Starsky & Hutch” – detectives who named their Ford Gran Torino “The Striped Tomato” – passed away Jan. 27 at age 66.

 

“When I graduated from BC3, I decided that since BC3 was a turning point in my life, if I had the opportunity, I wanted to give back.”

– Glenn T. Miller in 2019

 

“He truly saw the college as a tremendous asset to the community and to those outside the community. That passion was real.”

– Joseph E. Kubit, chair, BC3 board of trustees

 

“It is not going to be the same now without Glenn here,” said McCafferty, 65, a BC3 trustee since 2015. “There is going to be a void. People will definitely feel that void. Hopefully Glenn left an impression on so many people like he did on me. We’ll just have to take that torch and … just run with it.”

BC3’s board of trustees represents a policy-making body that provides direction and guidance to the president and administration of the college, which in addition to its main campus in Butler Township has locations in Brockway, Jefferson County; Cranberry Township, Butler County; Ford City, Armstrong County; and Shenango Township, Lawrence County.

Miller was a trustee longer than any other except Ray Steffler, who served 34 years, the final 20 as board chairman. Steffler passed away in 2019 at age 82.

“Having been a student and a graduate of BC3 and a part of its history for so many years as a board member, Glenn had an unmatched ability to speak with authority to those considering the college, to prospective students or to parents of prospective students,” said Joseph E. Kubit, board chair and a 1984 BC3 graduate.

“Everything he did, he did with a purpose. That’s who he was. He truly saw the college as a tremendous asset to the community and to those outside the community. That passion was real.”

The college, said BC3 President Megan M. Coval, “has lost a tremendous champion – an advocate and one of our greatest believers. Glenn loved BC3 deeply because of the experience he had here.

“Throughout his life after graduation, he kept coming back to the college in so many meaningful ways. His continued involvement showed his desire for as many people as possible to have the same experience he did. His service to BC3 was always rooted in that purpose.”

 

“I think he always felt honored to be an ambassador of BC3 and to be part of this bigger family.”

– Megan M. Coval, BC3 president

 

Butler County commissioners appoint new trustees, who serve six-year terms.

“When I graduated from BC3, I decided that since BC3 was a turning point in my life, if I had the opportunity, I wanted to give back,” Miller said in 2019. When appointed as a trustee, he said he thought, “If this is my way of giving back, I want to do this.’”

Miller served as board secretary in 2017, and from 2021 to present.

He was also the longtime chair of the board’s facilities committee, which is consulted on capital improvement master plans, and building renovations and ensures that BC3’s physical assets are well-maintained and suitable for all college-related classes and activities.

The college in the past three years has opened BC3 @ Armstrong in Ford City, the Victor K. Phillips Nursing and Allied Health Building on its main campus and BC3 @ Lawrence in Shenango Township.

 

“He was somebody who after you spent time with him made you think, ‘I need to be more like him, and the world would be a better place.’”

– Brian Opitz, BC3 executive director of operations

 

McCafferty and fellow trustee Joe Taylor served with Miller on the facilities committee.

Brian Opitz, BC3’s executive director of operations, works with the committee on behalf of the college.

“You don’t have people like Glenn come along very often,” Opitz said. “I spent a lot of time with him outside of the college because we were friends and had similar interests. You walked away from time with Glenn feeling good about yourself, feeling good about the project you were working on. If there was a challenge, he gave you the confidence that you were going to work through it and be successful, no matter what it was.

“That is huge in a person.”

Miller will also be missed for his humor, storytelling, memento-giving and hospitality, BC3 officials said.

“Such a kind spirit, with a rare gift for making people feel comfortable and at ease,” Coval said. “I feel like Glenn never really met a stranger. If we were all on campus or doing something together and someone new came into the mix, Glenn would be the first person to go over to that individual and not just say hi, but ask questions, show them around, welcome them. That is a really, really special kind of person.”

On her first day in September 2021 as executive director of the BC3 Education Foundation and external relations – the nonprofit fundraising partner of BC3 – “Glenn came in and handed me a check and said, ‘I want you to be able to say that on your first day on the job you got a donation,’” said Coval, who in 2025 was appointed by trustees as BC3’s ninth president.

Miller, Steffler, Lucille Shapiro and Kathleen Sommers helped to create the BC3 Alumni Association. Each was recognized in 2017 by having a BC3 Alumni Legacy Scholarship in their name.

 

“I feel honored to have experienced so much of my life with him and to watch and see firsthand what a true servant’s heart looks like.”

– Brian McCafferty, BC3 trustee

 

BC3, Miller said at the time of their recognition, “is a wonderful college with a wonderful Alumni Association. It is one of Butler County’s true gems, the college and its Alumni Association. BC3 is a wonderful representation of what Butler County is, and that is about the hometown, caring and reaching out to others.”

The college today has approximately 27,000 alumni.

“I know that Glenn was very proud of having graduated from BC3,” Kubit said. “He deeply appreciated the experience that he had at the college. I think that is what spurred in him a desire to serve on the board and to be able to be a strong representative for the college in any way that he could conceive or was asked to do.”

“I think he always felt honored to be an ambassador of BC3 and to be part of this bigger family,” Coval said.

“I feel honored to have experienced so much of my life with him,” McCafferty said, “and to watch and see firsthand what a true servant’s heart looks like.”

“He was somebody,” Opitz said, “who after you spent time with him made you think, ‘I need to be more like him, and the world would be a better place.’”

The man known as a teenager as “The Pioneer” on a CB radio was proud of BC3’s expansion into western Pennsylvania counties under-represented by higher education, McCafferty said, that 93 percent of the college’s Class of 2025 graduated debt-free and that BC3 has been ranked as the No. 1 community college in Pennsylvania 11 times since 2015.

“How can you not be Pioneer proud,” McCafferty said, “of seeing what BC3 is today?”

Miller was a third-generation director with the Thompson-Miller Funeral Home in Butler. Following his graduation from BC3, he earned a bachelor’s degree from Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania and a diploma from Pittsburgh Institute of Mortuary Science.

A viewing will be held from 1 to 4 p.m. and from 6 to 9 p.m. Feb. 1 at the Thompson-Miller Funeral Home, 124 E. North St., Butler. A funeral is scheduled at 11 a.m. Feb. 2 at the funeral home. According to Miller’s obituary, memorial donations can be made in his name to BC3, 107 College Drive, Butler, PA 16002, or to First United Methodist Church, 1802 N. Main St. Extension, Butler, PA 16001.