Juanita Nelms Kirby

Born in Etowah, Tenn., Mrs. Kirby spent much of her childhood in Fairmount, Ga., and then moved to Rome, Ga., where she worked as a nurse and met and married her future husband. The couple moved to Jacksonville, Ala., where she became a dental hygienist, the field where she devoted her career. Mrs. Kirby and her family moved to Homewood in 1968, where she worked with the dental practices of Dr. Milner Snuggs and Dr. Darrell Roberson until she retired at age 80. It was a family joke that her hands had been in the mouths of half of Birmingham. She was a longtime member of the American Dental Assistants Association and served many years on the executive board of the Alabama Dental Assistants Association.

Mrs. Kirby was an active member of Dawson Memorial Baptist Church, where she served for many years as a fifth-grade Sunday School teacher and also worked with the church’s ESL program. She sang with the Dawsonaires senior adult choir, and thoroughly enjoyed choir tours with the group as well as other senior adult travel programs organized by the church.

She was preceded in death by an infant son, John Wesley Kirby, Jr., and her husband, John Wesley Kirby. She is survived by a son and daughter-in-law, Alan Richard Kirby and Jean Marie Campbell of Hoover, Ala; two sisters, Betty Nelms of Acworth, Ga., and Edna Newman of Knoxville, Tenn.; a brother, William Nelms of Portage, Wis.; two granddaughters; two step-granddaughters; three great-grandchildren; and several nieces and nephews.

Services will be held Sunday, March 19. Visitation will begin at noon with the memorial service at 1 p.m. at Ridout’s Valley Chapel in Homewood, Ala. Interment to follow at Greenlawn Cemetery in Jacksonville, Ala.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the Alzheimer’s Association. Services are under the direction of Ridout's Valley Chapel (205-879-3401) in Homewood.