Betty B. Parker
AGE: 91 • Catonsville, MD - Wilmington, DE
Betty Parker, age 91, of Catonsville, MD, formerly of Wilmington, DE, died peacefully on July 5, 2016. Betty was born in Oklahoma City, the daughter of the late Charlotte Jeanette (McCorkle) and Oren Clifford Barefoot. She grew up in Ponca City where she was a cheerleader and played on the high school tennis team but graduated from Bosse High School, Evansville IN. A 1946 graduate of the University of Oklahoma, she was a member of Gamma Phi Beta sorority and a cheerleader.
Betty traveled extensively in the West as a child and throughout the country and the world with her husband and family, visiting 47 states and 11 countries over her lifetime. She enjoyed sightseeing, birding and photography on these trips. She loved to read, enjoyed Big Band and Broadway music, and, in later life, became an early computer adopter, including compiling extensive family genealogical records. Artistic and creative, she hand-made family heirlooms such as Christmas tree skirts and a large, embroidered family tree bedspread used at a family reunion.
She met her husband, Richard vanCortlandt Parker of New Jersey at a wartime dance near the Army base where he was stationed. She worked in a shipyard as a draftswoman for the war effort. They were married in Ft. Thomas, KY on June 25, 1947. Following his graduation from Princeton, the couple moved to Akron OH where their three children were born. They moved to Wilmington DE in 1954, establishing the family's home for the next 62 years. In the 1970s the couple lived in England and Ireland for work, returning to their Delaware home where they lived until moving in March of this year to a retirement home in Maryland.
Betty's family was the focus of her life -- she was a Den Mother, a Girl Scout leader and supported the busy lives of her children and husband. She also worked as kindergarten teacher for several years. They were members of Christ Church Christiana Hundred.
Betty was preceded in death by her sister, Jocelia B. Fergus and grandson, Daniel Ellenbogen Parker. She is survived by her beloved husband Dick, her children, Charlotte P Vincent (Frank), R. Wayne Parker (Helene Ellenbogen) and Robert P. Parker (Linda), four wonderful grandchildren - Emily Vincent, Elizabeth Parker Eichfeld, James Parker, Micah Parker and a great granddaughter, Eliza Ruth Eichfeld. All their children and their spouses recently joined Dick and Betty to celebrate their 69th Wedding Anniversary.
Burial services will be held Saturday, August 6, 2016 at 2 P.M. at Christ Church Christiana Hundred, 505 E. Buck Road, Wilmington, DE 19807. A reception will follow.
Contributions in lieu of flowers to Gamma Phi Beta, 12737 East Euclid Drive, Centennial, Colorado 80111