Virginia Fikes

Virginia Ellen Fikes, 74, of Big Lake, passed away Sept. 14. 2008 at Providence Hospital in Anchorage from heart failure.

Friends are invited to attend the memorial service at 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 21, at VFW Post 9365. Private interment will be Monday at Ft. Richardson National Cemetery.

Fikes was born May 14, 1934 in Sebastopol, Calif., and enjoyed gardening, gold prospecting, collecting antiques, pianos and especially old dolls, and spending time with her family. She was the wife of a 21-year Army veteran, with a son who served in the Army and a daughter in the Air Force. She came to Alaska in 1965, living in Eagle River as well as Big Lake.

She was a member of the VFW Auxiliary, American Legion Auxiliary and worked as the Civil Defense emergency coordinator.

 “Mom knew good things,” her family wrote. “She knew a good man when she met him, and married him. She knew how to support him in his chosen field and made sure his uniforms were pressed and dinner was waiting when he got home.

“She knew how to raise children and give them the tools they would need to make it through life; a critical and questioning mind was important, believing things just because someone said it was so, was not in our raising,” they wrote. “Puppies, kittens, horses and mules were. It never mattered what we did or how far we roamed, we always knew where home was, and that we were welcome there if we needed shelter from life’s storms.”

Her family said the simple things were important to Fikes: children’s birthdays, sitting by the lake with a fishing pole, watching the roses and puppies and children and grandchildren grow.

Fikes is survived by her husband of 59 years, Billy L. Fikes, of Big Lake; brothers Clifford Burke of Eureka, Cal., William Burke of Santa Rosa, Cal, and Donald Burke of Branson, Miss., sister Phyllis Gregson of Boise, Idaho; daughters Helen Hegener of Meadow Lakes, Linda Beasley of Tucson, Ariz., Susan Patch of Deer Park, Wash., and Sandra Jean Fikes of Big Lake; sons Lewis Monroe Fikes of Big Lake and Billy Fikes Jr. of Meadow Lakes; and numerous grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by her parents Virginia and George, and brother George Burke, all of northern California.

Valley Funeral Homes & Crematory of Palmer and Wasilla is assisting the family.