Millar Hague, Carol Christina

Peacefully and painlessly, accompanied by the music of a harp, on Sunday, July 12, 2026 at the Hawkesbury General Hospital, Carol Christina Millar Hague of Hawkesbury and Vankleek Hill, Ontario, died at the age of seventy-seven. Predeceased by her husband Richard Hague, her parents Robert Millar and Phyllis Butt, and her siblings Howard Millar and Heather (Millar) Bentley. Survived by her brother-in-law Jim Bentley, her sister-in-law Nora Hague (Leo Nikkinen) and many cousins. In accordance with Carol’s wishes, there was no service and private cremation has taken place. Carol was a free spirit, bouncy, gregarious, strong willed, and thoroughly obsessed by music. Influenced by Robert McDonald, her Grade 10 English teacher and musical director, she earned a Licentiate followed by a Bachelor of Music at McGill, in keyboard and choral, and became a private music teacher in both disciplines. She met Richard while they were both members of a synagogue choir, married about a year later and settled in an innovative stack-wood house on Highway 34, near Vankleek Hill. She and Richard joined the Tudor Singers and traveled across Canada in concert tours. They started their own musical group, Amaryllis Choir, whose members were local women in the Vankleek Hill and Embrun region, and their Christmas concerts usually held in the church at St. Eugene, were breathtaking. During their summers at Metis on the Lower St. Lawrence, Richard and Carol ran the local Cascade Golf and Tennis Club’ daily activities, and (of course) started a local choir in St. George’s Anglican summer church. She loved her summers at Metis, and volunteered at the library, cataloguing books. Carol and her friend Ian were the prime movers of the popular Vankleek Hill Music Festival, which ran in the summers for several weeks with competing bands and artists, and children playing various instruments. Having worked at Smith’s Florists on the South Shore near Montréal, Carol was a font of knowledge concerning plants, and helped those of us with two black thumbs (as opposed to green thumbs,) and was a member of the Vankleek Hill Horticultural Society and a supporter of the Vankleek Hill Nature Society. After Richard died, Carol found the house in Vankleek Hill hard to handle, so she moved to Hawkesbury. She shared her life with budgies and a series of dogs, all of whom had disabilities. One had but three legs, another had attitude difficulties, one was absolutely enormous, and almost all had come from rescue organizations. Her last dog was Rocky, a senior dog, who has luckily found a new home with an equally senior dog. In her rare spare time, Carol enjoyed reading, knitting (inspired by her mother-in-law Joan Hague,) and would pass the evenings singing with the dog, and hosting parties with her army of close friends. Latterly she joined a handbell group, the Knox Hand Bell Choir, which she thoroughly enjoyed. She lived by two mottos, “Violence is the last refuge of the Ignorant” and “This too shall pass,” and was always ready with a laugh or a tear (as appropriate) for life’s passing circumstances. We will miss her effervescent presence and our sharing of opinions on various subjects, but wherever she has gone, she will find music. Please honour her memory by contributing to a charity or organization of your choice, keeping music in mind.