On Tuesday, May 7, 2024, in the town of Wilmer, Alabama Our beloved mother, Virginia Ackerman Hardesty Wigfield found her Peace on this earthly plane and passed away. She was 84 years old. She was born to Roberta Anderson Parker (Van Dyke) and Richard Parker on June 16, 1939, in Ithaca, New York. After the death of her birth father, she was adopted at the age of 3 by Henry and Doris Ackerman. She was married first to Clarence Hardesty and later to Raymond Wigfield, both who preceded her in death.
She has 4 children: Pamela Hardesty Steele (Robert Steele), Betsy Hardesty Dunlap (deceased) Russell L. Hardesty (Tonya Hardesty, Rhonda L. Hardesty Scroggins (Michael Scroggins). She has 10 grandchildren: April Hardesty Bogart, Jimmy Matthews, Robert Stanley Dunlap, Christopher Dunlap, Lauren Trout Lee, Taylor Hardesty, Tristan Hardesty, Hannah Scroggins, Samantha Scroggins, Serena Scroggins. She has 11 great-grandchildren: Julia Hardesty Benton, Kayla Bogart, Tyler Matthew, James Dunlap, Caleb Hadley, Logan Dunlap, Trinity Dunlap, Arianna Hadley, Nova Hadley, Bradley Lee, Brooklyn Lee. She has 2 great great-grandchildren, Bailey Benton, Kaia Hardesty.
She was raised in Ithaca, New York where she loved to play amongst the many waterfalls. In her later years she loved to talk about the beauty of the mountains and waterfalls around Ithaca. Later she moved to Ft. Wayne, Indiana to live and work. In 1972 she and her family set down their final roots in Mobile, AL.
In her earlier years, she earned an associate degree in interior design and hospitality. During the wars, she helped build ammunition and worked in the different hospital operating rooms. She worked for many years working in various restaurants where she would tell everyone about the famous people she had met and known. Later in life she earned her Nursing Degree and would work as a Home Health Nurse. She had an incredible work ethic, often volunteering, and working 2 or 3 jobs at time. It pleased her ad worried her so much that she passed on this work ethic to her children. She was so glad to see them working so hard at their jobs and that they were all hard workers but wanted them to enjoy live as well.
She loved to travel and explore new places. She gave all her children a love of nature and animals and inspired them all to see the beauty in those things. She was a lover of birds and could name most of them in an instant. She was an avid gardener of flowers. She loved flowers of all types, and her room was always full of the many flower arrangements given to her by her children. She loved to paint, read and watch game shows. She loved to sew and would often sew clothes for her children, including prom dresses for her older daughters. She would sew Barbie clothes and make beautiful bed dolls made to look like Azalea Trail maids and brides.
She always said that she had one goal in life: Have and raise her 4 beautiful children. She accomplished this goal. Even with working 2 or 3 jobs at a time you would often find her helping at Nan Gray Davis School, going on field trips and hosting school parties. She would volunteer at the schools to help struggling children to read, write and to understand math. No matter how tired she was from working she always found time for her children.
There will be no formal ceremony. She will be cremated, and her ashes scattered amongst the mountains that she loved so much.
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