Sarah Kathyleen Sparks

Kathyleen Sparks, age 89, a long-time Fort Payne resident, passed away peacefully on Tuesday, July 4, 2017. She was born Sarah Kathyleen “Kat” Oliver on March 30, 1928 in Sand Rock, Alabama, to Fredrick D Oliver and Stella E. Brock. She was the eighth of eleven children in a family who picked cotton and lived farm life. Kathyleen married Paul Dean Sparks on March 30, 1946 and made their home in Fort Payne and made a wonderful team. They delighted in their only daughter, Charlotte Louise. She spent her adult life working as a hosiery employee which began at WB DAVIS “Big Mill”, Southland Hosiery, and then moved to WY Shugart & Son Hosiery Mill where she was an employee well into her 70’s and counted her co-workers as friends. She was also a dedicated member of Gault Avenue Baptist Church and the VFW Ladies Auxiliary. In addition to her role of wife, mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother, she was always a beloved sister and aunt. Rarely known to sit down, she led a diligent life. She never took shortcuts and could cook, manage a garden, can vegetables, grow pecans, sew a dress, paint both indoors and out, repair plumbing, clean gutters, and thought nothing of climbing on the roof if it needed repairing, at her home or someone else’s. She carried tools in the trunk of her car, knew her way around the kitchen, knew the value of a dollar and the importance of keeping short accounts. She was joyful, jovial and deeply appreciated things – a good joke, freshly baked cornbread and sweet milk, a tomato grown in her garden, strawberry preserves, an old gospel hymn and time spent with loved ones. She was fiercely loyal and loved “her people.” She was kind and had profound gratitude for her life and loved ones. She made a quiet impact on the lives of everyone she knew, even up to her last days, and she will be deeply missed. Funeral services will be 3:00pm Thursday, July, 6, 2017 at Wilson Funeral Home Chapel with Dr. Mike Mitchell and Rev. Jerry Davis officiating. Burial will follow in Glenwood Cemetery. The family will receive friends on Thursday beginning at 1:00pm until the 3:00pm hour of service at the funeral home. Survivors include her daughter, Charlotte Sparks Bell of Fort Payne; her only granddaughter, Megan Kathleen (Bell) Trolard and husband Ron Trolard (who she loved as her own); and great-grandson, Oliver Dean Trolard all of Birmingham; brothers John Henry (Genell) Oliver and JT Oliver, both of Chattanooga, Tennessee; sister Bobbie Goodwin of Centre, Alabama and numerous nieces and nephews. She is preceded in death by her husband, Paul Dean Sparks and by siblings Bernie Pledger, Milton Oliver, Carl Oliver, Inez Jones and Thelma Smith.

Sarah Kathyleen Sparks

March 30, 1928 - July 4, 2017