Norma Parrish Archbold
Norma Parrish Archbold….stubborn, show me state, farm girl, first child, loving big sister, wife, mother/mother-in-law, aunt and granny, who was also a genealogist, patent holder, entrepreneur, author; and an intelligent, creative, logical and deeply religious person.
Born Norma Pearl Parrish on Feb. 15, 1938 in Portage de Sioux, a daughter of Henry Kimler Parrish and Ruth Watson Fountain Parrish, died Friday, Aug. 16, 2019 at the age of 81 and a half plus one day. She had been admitted to the hospital for breathing difficulties and after a battery of tests, lesions were found on her lungs. A diagnosis of advanced metastatic disease was provided. The disease progressed quickly and virtually painlessly through to the peaceful end of her precious life.
Visitation will be held from 10 a.m.-noonWednesday at Myers Funeral Home in Middletown.
Burial will follow at the Fairmount Cemetery in Middletown.
Norma graduated from Bowling Green High School in 1955,was first chair in clarinet (rating first in state competition) under the guidance of musical director Charles Wells and went on to earn her bachelor of liberal arts degree from Mizzou in 1959.
She married her college beau, Kenyan Alan Archbold, in1961, had four kids and resided in the Chicago area (except for nine years living in Israel) for the remainder of her life.
In 1968 Norma published an update to the Duncan Family Register listing marriages and additions of family patriarch the Rev. Lewis Duncan. She worked as the director of religious education for St. Thomas of Villanova in Palatine, St. Mary’s in Des Plaines and Our Lady Mother of the Church in Chicago.
In 1974, she earned a master’s degree in religious education from Loyola University in Chicago. In 1975 Norma tapped into her analytical talents and joined Western Electric as an engineer assistant. While with Western Electric she developed a unique wiring harness for which she was granted a U.S. Patent.
Feeling that her talents were being wasted a friend askedher to lead a startup company selling computer aided Numerical Control (CNC) software systems run on Apple computers to tool and die shops. The company, Apple Tree, Inc., was at the forefront of CNC technology and sales were booming. In June 1982 tragedy struck. Norma, while coming back from installing a new CNC system, was severely injured in a small plane crash that killed the pilot. She was travelling from Louisiana with the owner of a tool and die shop.
After spending two years healing from the accident Norma started a mailing store to re-exercise her entrepreneur spirit. She built up a solid company over the next three years.
In 1988, Norma moved to Israel to serve the Lord in Jerusalem and the West Bank where she researched and wrote “The Mountains of Israel, the Bible and the West Bank”. She also spent time reaching out to Palistinians, arranging for emergency aid to Christians, and fighting for a high standard of truth in the media. One of the highlights of Israel for Norma was working with Sima Skurkovitz, a Nazi concentration camp survivor. Norma was the editor of Sima’s autobiography, “Sima’s Songs: Light in Nazi Darkness”.
Norma returned to the Chicago area and continued her writing. Her first book has been well received and sold over 125,000 copies and published in over 10 languages. She followed up her first book with “The Green Horse, the Bible and Islam”.
Norma has spent 20 years retired living independently (until recently) in her home in Plainfield, Ill. She attended Friendship Baptist Church in Plainfield and Bethel Baptist Church in St. Charles. A year ago she moved to The Bickford in St Charles, an assisted living facility, where she was adored by her new friends and the Bickford staff.
She is survived by her four children, Cameron Alan Archbold and wife, Rayma, of Omaha, Neb., Jennifer Anne Fredrickson and husband, Leonard of St. Charles, Ill., Jeffrey Thomas Archbold, of Geneva, Ill., and Christopher Michael Archbold and wife, Kerrie Borneman, of Batavia, Ill.; six grandchildren; brother and sister-in-law, Henry Kimler and Carol Schneider Parrish of New Hartford; a sister, Wilma Ellen Parrish Douglass of Bethesda, Mary.; in addition to nieces and nephews.
She was preceded in death by her parents, Henry and Ruth Parrish.
Norma was a great woman, loved by her children, her sisterand brother, cousins, nieces, nephews and friends.
Memorial contributions are suggested to Dementia Societyof America c/o Myers Funeral Home, 203 East Bates Street, Wellsville, MO 63384.
Expressions of sympathy may be made to the family at www.myersfuneralhome.biz.
