Cathy was born to John H. Doyle and Marion Hoystead on January 7, 1930, in Newark, New Jersey. She grew up in North Arlington, New Jersey, graduating from Queen of Peace High School in 1949. Cathy worked for the Newark Evening News and Public Service before staying home to raise her children, having met her husband Bernard (Bob) Robert Mitchell at the Newark Evening News, spending the next 65 years of marriage in Sparta, New Jersey.
In her own words, “If you want to get somewhere, love each other.” The ever-quotable Cathy had a knack for becoming the life of the party. Cathy enjoyed telling stories to anyone who would listen, from her humble beginnings as “a young bum on the streets of New York and had no home and had sat on Port Authority [she] sat there with [her] dirty old clothes, with nothing to eat. It was so sad, [she] cried,” (*these are her own words, but are unconfirmed, as by all other accounts indicate she had an apparently normal upbringing) to her later battle stories of raising three children that resulted in a perpetual state of civil war in her home. Her aversion to dirt or messes of any kind was often softened by her love of her friends and family, even allowing many family dogs to take refuge inside her meticulously cleaned home, with or without her husband’s knowledge, even though she may not have wanted them to touch, or even look at her.
Cathy is predeceased by her husband Bob, her sisters Cissy and Eileen, and her son Bobby.
She is survived by her children William (Don), Patricia, grandchildren Mary (Jackie), Michael, and Hayley (Alex), and close friends Mr. Jim Beam and Mr. Jack Daniels.
Visitation to be held August 6, 2026, at Goble Funeral Home, 22 Main St, Sparta, NJ 07871 from 4:00-8:00 pm, with a Funeral Mass at Our Lady of the Lake Roman Catholic Church, 294 S Sparta Ave, Sparta, NJ 07871 on August 7, 2026, at 10:00 am.
Interment will follow immediately at Sparta Cemetery.
