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Joelle Rutherford (Juillarad) was full of life and adventure, always in search of a new place to explore, especially if it was a beach near warm ocean water. Her search came to an end in October 2019, but not until she had graduated from UCLA with honors in political science, earned her Ph.D., and gone on for her MSW. Among her professional accomplishments, she was on the faculty of Women's Studies at USC, and later in life, she had a clinical practice. While pursuing graduate studies in France, she met Guy Juillard, a world-renowned radiation oncologist. They settled in LA, raised two daughters who also excelled in their professions. Joelle remained active in choral and dance groups and theater groups. She was an avid butterfly gardener, a gourmet cook, and a passionate observer of the political scene. Her wanderlust took her on trips up the Amazon, on safari to Kenya, and most often to France, where she and Guy had a lovely family house. Joelle is greatly missed by her family and her many riends arouond the world. (written by Judy David)
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Marilla J. Watts (Whitney)
The Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles, California) • Thu, Nov 21, 2019
JUILLARD, Joelle Rutherford 1944 - 2019 The family of Joelle Rutherford Juillard is saddened to share the news of her recent passing. She is survived by two daughters and their respective spouses, two granddaughters, a sister, and three nieces.
Joelle was born in 1944 in Arcadia, California, to Dwight and Mildred Rutherford. She was the middle of three sisters. When she was in grammar school she moved with her family to Lafayette, California, where she attended high school at Acalanes. There she made her first of many lifelong friends — and indeed, making and maintaining decades-long friendships was a common theme throughout Joelle's life.
After graduating from Acalanes, Julie enrolled at UCLA, where she was a Political Science major. She also minored in French, and spent her junior year studying abroad in Bordeaux, where again she made close friends she would stay in contact with and visit for the rest of her life. After achieving her Bachelors degree with Phi Beta Kappa honors, Joelle went on to pursue her PhD in Political Science, also at UCLA. The focus of her research was 20th-century French politics and during her studies, she won a fellowship to study at the Institut Europeen des Hautes Etudes Internationales in Nice, France.
It was while in Nice that she made the fortuitous decision to go hitchhiking with a friend around town, leading her future husband, Guy Willard, to pick her up. Guy was chief physician at the Division of Radiation Therapy at the Cancer Center in Nice, and the two began dating and eventually married on August 30, 1968. They would remain married, and close partners in all aspects of life, If for nearly 50 years until Guy's death in February of 2018.
In 1973 Joelle and Guy moved to Los Angeles, California, where Guy worked as a professor at UCLA Medical Center and Joelle, having completed her PhD, took up a position as a lecturer at USC, where she also directed the Study for Men and Women in Society. During this time Guy and Joelle's two children were born, Catherine and Genevieve.
In 1985 Joelle left USC to focus on her family, however she was not one who could resist a project and always had her hand in many pots. She was very active in the community, including acting as editor of the Social Service Review, and ran a consulting practice supporting PhD students with their dissertation writing. In the early 1990s Joelle went back to school to study for a Master of Social Work and eventually became a licensed clinical social worker (LCSW), working in both private practice and for schools and municipalities until she retired in the early 2000s.
In addition to Joelle's work and her many social engagements with friends, she was very involved in community service, and in her leisure time she read avidly, sang for community and choir groups, and was a dedicated butterfly gardener. Perhaps above all, however, Joelle loved travel, and during her breaks she could reliably be found on one intrepid adventure or another, whether it be cruising the Amazon, touring through Russia, or studying immersive Spanish in Costa Rica. Over the course of her marriage to Guy, she spent many months and years in France, where they returned to live nearly full-time following his retirement. But perhaps most of all she loved the beach, which was a calming and happy place for her. In the mid-1990s, Guy and Joelle bought a beach house in Manhattan Beach, California, where they spent many happy weekends and holidays enjoying the ocean views and waves, and where she lived her final years before passing away.