“My one journey is over…my new one begins.”  Fairy I. Parkins, 91 passed away November 20, 2024 at Bluffton Hospital.  

Born during the Depression Era on December 22, 1932 in Findlay to the late Ira and Louisa (Schaaff) Roth, Fairy saw many changes. She saw horse drawn equipment change to tractors, oil lamps to electric, radio to TV and party lines to cell phones. Fairy experienced the atomic age, a man on the moon, sixteen presidents and the growth of the computer age. Growing up on the farm, she was always her Dad’s helper. She carried lanterns to the barn, drove horses to make hay and in 1949, a John Deere Tractor.  

Graduating seventy-five years ago, in 1950, from the first combined class of Cory-Rawson High School, Fairy always let people know that and that the Cory-Rawson colors were green and gold.  She got her first job in 1951 at Woolworth’s Dime Store then became a bookkeeper at Daisy Maid Bread when Edward Parkins was discharged from the Korean Conflict and was hired as a new driver. A love match sparked and on April 22, 1954, she married Edward Parkins who preceded her in death on May 4, 1986 from a battle with cancer. ▶︎