Jane Gates Washburn Parker died on May 20, 2023, of natural causes in Newton, comforted during her final days by her loving family. She was 96.
She was born in 1926 in Arlington, Mass., to Ruth Prior Koehler Washburn and John Milton Washburn Jr. Throughout her childhood, she was active in Girl Scouts, Rainbow Girls, St. John’s Episcopal Church and high school athletics.
During the Depression, she spent several happy summers at Camp Chimney Corners in the Berkshires. As a high school student during World War II, she helped pick apples and raspberries for market on her grandparents’ farm in Marlboro, Mass. While in college, she worked as waterfront director at a Girl Scout camp in New Hampshire.
At Simmons College in Boston, she enrolled in nursing before switching to home economics. As senior class president and softball team captain, she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in 1948.
That fall, she married Eugene LeRoy Parker Jr., Harvard College ’46, who predeceased her in 2013. Before the birth of their first child in 1949, she taught home economic skills in the extension service for rural Middlesex County, Mass.
After living for 10 years in North Babylon, N.Y., Jane and Gene moved to Plainfield, N.J., in 1962. There they raised and educated five beloved children who survive her with their spouses: Eugene LeRoy Parker III, JD (Jo Ann) of Tennessee, Suzann Parker Leist, MBA (Joe) of Kentucky, Wendy Parker Knudsen, MD (Mark) of Oregon, Gates Washburn Parker, DMD (Cathy) of New Jersey, and Prior Lewis Parker, MD (Maria) of Rhode Island.
In Plainfield, she led Cub Scout and Girl Scout groups, rode her Raleigh bike all over town, and supervised the Seidler Field pool and a water program for infants at the high school. Every Thanksgiving for 50 years, family and friends gathered in their spacious home, where wonderful memories were made. At Christmas, the variety in her cookie boxes was legendary.
Jane enjoyed singing, first in the Babylon Chorale, then in the choir at Grace Episcopal, Plainfield, and later at St. Mary’s Episcopal, Sparta.
While her children were in college and graduate school, Jane earned her master’s in education in 1972 and doctorate in vocational education in 1981 from Rutgers University.
She taught several years at St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Edison, then began a long career in environmental services. At UMDNJ in Newark, she trained staff campus-wide, wrote manuals and helped the hospital pass JCAHO inspections. She was executive director for training and development in the Department of Environmental Services when she retired in 2013 at age 86.
Jane moved the following year to a senior living community at UMC Bristol Glen in Newton. For six years, she shared her sewing expertise weekly at Ryan’s Case for Smiles and made new friends.
She was a remarkable woman - a talented homemaker, dedicated professional, and devoted wife and mother.
In addition to her children, Jane is survived by a brother, John Milton Washburn III of Michigan, and a sister, Ann Prior Washburn Samuels of Texas; nine grandchildren; eight great-grandchildren; and many nieces, nephews and cousins across the United States.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Friday, July 21 at UMC Bristol Glen, 200 Bristol Glen Drive, Newton.
Memorial donations may be made to Becket-Chimney Corners YMCA, 748 Hamilton Road, Becket, MA 01223, Attn: JM Washburn Jr./JGWParker Memorial Fund.