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19-year-old crash victim wanted to teach
The woman was a freshman at Westminster College.
HUBBARD — A 19-year-old Lowellville woman, who died in a car accident on her way to class, had a passion for dance and was thinking of becoming a teacher, her father said.
Ever since she was 2, Loren Mistovich danced.
She spent a lot of time at J J’s Dance Depot on North Main Street in Hubbard, taking and teaching dance classes in jazz, ballet and tap, said Marty Mistovich, her father.
Even though she was a freshman at Westminster College in New Wilmington, Pa., she still found time to teach kids at J J about twice a week, her father said.
“She was extraordinary,” her father said. “You couldn’t help liking her. She had respect for everyone. She was a very loving person and cared about everybody.”
Mistovich was driving east in a 1998 Ford Escort about 8:30 a.m. Tuesday on Interstate 80 in Hubbard near the Ohio-Pennsylvania line when she swerved the car to the left, striking the median and overturning, said Lt. Joseph Dragovich, commander of the Ohio State Highway Patrol’s Warren Post.
The accident caused her to be thrown through the driver’s side window, he said. Mistovich wasn’t wearing a seat belt, he said.
The cause of the accident hasn’t been determined.
A graduate of Lowellville High School this past spring, Mistovich was a freshman at Westminster. She enjoyed teaching kids, and was considering becoming a teacher, her father said.
“She just started” at Westminster, he said. “She wasn’t quite sure.”
She also worked at Family Video in Girard for the past few months.
“Loren was a really, really great person,” said Mark Yoo, the company’s district manager, who hired her. “She was kind to everyone. We were happy to have her with us. Everyone in the [Girard] stores is in shock. It’s unbelievable. There’s a girl who was doing all the right stuff: going to school, working. She was going to be great at whatever she wanted to do.”
skolnick@vindy.com