By Connor Adams Sheets
By Connor Sheets
Cecilia Malizia, who worked for the TimesLedger Newspapers as an administrative assistant for 16 years, died suddenly Saturday night at her home in Bay Terrace. She was 65.
Born Sept. 6, 1945 in Manhattan, she moved to Astoria with her family and then in 1983 to Whitestone, where she lived until last year.
For many years she worked at Woolworth’s in downtown Manhattan and at Long Island Savings Bank. She then joined the staff of Waldbaum’s in Bay Terrace, where she was part of the floral department at the time of her death, and the TimesLedger Newspapers, publisher of the Bayside Times and 11 other weekly newspapers in Queens.
She was known to her co-workers and friends as Ceal.
“Ceal was a loyal and dedicated member of the staff who went out of her way to help others in the office,” said James Spielman, vice president of marketing and operations for Community Newspaper Group, owner of the TimesLedger. “She will be missed greatly.”
At the TimesLedger offices in Bayside Malizia’s wide range of duties included handling newspaper subscriptions, helping with circulation, pulling and sending copies of advertisements to clients, assisting sales staff in daily tasks and answering phones.
Steven Blank, former publisher of the TimesLedger, hired Malizia as an administrative assistant in the mid-1990s. He said she was always ready and willing to take on any number of tasks that needed to be done at the newspaper.
“We were her family and she treated the office at the TimesLedger as an extension of her family,” Blank said.
She is survived by her two nieces, Amy Lalicata and Meghan Marone, and her brother-in-law James Hamilton. Her sister Carol Hamilton died in 2009.
In the last years of her life she doted on her two great nieces — Kaitlyn Lalicata, 5, and Emily Lalicata, 10 months – who brought her enormous joy.
A wake was held at Gleason’s Funeral Home at 10-25 150th St. Tuesday from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. and from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. The funeral was planned for Wednesday at St. Luke’s Church at 16-34 Clintonville St. in Whitestone followed by burial at Calvary Cemetery.
