Dianne Manning

Dianne Catherine Manning entered her heavenly home on September 3, 2026, after a courageous two-year battle with pancreatic cancer.  She was the epitome of practical optimism and possessed the kindest heart. Her greetings to her family were filled genuine love and excitement upon seeing them

She was born in Billings, Montana, the third daughter of Henry and Mary Lou Vandal. Along with her sisters, Anita, Linda and Suzi, she attended Holy Rosary Grade School and Billings Central Catholic High School, graduating in 1966. She grew up on the family ranch on Blue Creek, where she developed a lifelong love for animals, open country and the pleasures of being outdoors. Summers were spent helping around the ranch, hiking the coulees and taking moonlit horseback rides. She often invited friends from town to stay and get a taste of ranch life for themselves. Rainy June days meant baking cherry pies and molasses cookies, while clear evenings were meant to be spent outside.

Dianne was blessed with two wonderful sons from a previous marriage, Brett Cline and Marcus Cline (Angela). She was an exceptionally devoted mother who gave her boys a childhood filled with love, encouragement and the certainty that she would always be there for them.

In 1981, she married her life partner, Michael Manning, beginning a loving partnership that would last more than four decades. They built a life together around family, hard work and a shared love of the Montana outdoors. She spent 30 years working at Lextron Animal Health, where she became a favorite of many customers. She had an easy way with people, genuinely enjoyed visiting with them, and formed friendships that extended well beyond the business of the day.

She and Mike built a small cabin in Whispering Pines on the Boulder River, where some of the family's best memories were made fly-fishing, playing pool, hiking and enjoying time together. In 2015, Dianne designed and built her dream home on their farm in the foothills above Joliet. In early 2016 she kindly invited Mike to join her, with one caveat, he would promise to plow the road. Mike got a skid steer and the rest is history.

Always the gardener, she planted trees, bushes and perennials  taking great pleasure in watching them grow. She loved the hillsides covered in wildflowers, listening to the mourning doves and meadowlarks and the remarkable assortment of wildlife that wandered through the property.  Daily Defender rides with beloved Black Labradors, Reggie and then Taz, would often start and end the day.  Even after years of living there, she never seemed to lose the excitement of spotting an elk on the hillside or discovering something new blooming along the trail.

Another great joy came with being a grandmother to her four grandsons, Jack, William, Nicholas and Thomas. She loved being their grandmother and gave them the kind of love only a grandmother can give: generous, patient, proud and seemingly without limit.

She had deep appreciation for daughter in law Kayla Cline, who bravely moved her young family to the small community of Joliet, Mt to raise the boys, very much to the approval of Mike and Dianne.

She lived her life with joy and was simply a pleasure to be around. She loved her family fiercely, enjoyed people, laughed easily and found happiness in things that others might pass by without noticing. A horseback ride under the moon, a rainy afternoon baking cookies, wildflowers on a hillside, an elk appearing in the distance or an afternoon surrounded by family were never small things to her. They were the good stuff.

For the final two years of her life, she faced pancreatic cancer with remarkable strength and grace. Even on difficult days, she tried to spare those she loved from the weight of what she was going through, greeting her family with a smile and a brave face. Cancer may have occupied the final chapter of her life, but it never came close to defining her story.

That story was written over a lifetime: on a ranch along Blue Creek, raising two boys, building a life with Mike, loving four grandsons, working with people who became friends, and roaming the hills above Joliet in her 4x4 looking for wildlife.

It was a life well lived, in a place she loved, surrounded by people who loved her. And she will be missed beyond measure.

Services are tentatively planned for May 2027, when the hills are green and her flowers are blooming.