Kathryn Burke Parrish

Kathryn, known to all as "Tat" Parrish was born August 14, 1920, in Dallas. She was the youngest of five children of Richard J F Burke and Eva Powers Burke. The family moved around Texas and Louisiana with her father's business during the Depression, but returned to Dallas where she graduated from Adamson High School, then known as Oak Cliff High.

While working for the Dallas office of Addressograph-Multigraph Corporation, a pioneer technology company creating customer address labels, she met her future husband, James F. Parrish. The couple was very outgoing and enjoyed entertaining and many lifelong friendships.

She worked the Dallas gift and merchandise markets for years, and delighted in giving gifts to family, friends, friends' children and their children - every birthday, every graduation.

After losing her only daughter, Lynda Ann Parrish, her dearest friend "loaned" her own four daughters to comfort her for the rest of her life. They called her "Kathryn Popo," a Chinese expression for "grandmother."

She was widely traveled and made twenty-two trips to Europe and the Orient with friends and her Lovers Lane Methodist Church group after her eightieth birthday. After also losing her husband, Jim Parrish, she lived independently in her home past her one hundred and second birthday.

She is survived by her son, Ronald Parrish and wife, Beth of Fort Worth; grandson, Scott Parrish and wife, Jean of the Woodlands, and their children, Rachel, John and Wesley; granddaughter, Amy Elizabeth Covert-Karpathy and husband, Zoltan Karpathy of Venice, Florida, and her sons, Benjamin and Barrett; nieces, Colleen Phillips of Los Angeles, Char Lovett Sutherland of Dallas, Cheryl Lovett Ross of Keller; nephews, Gary Burke of Windsor Locks Connecticut and Dennis Burke of Monroe, Louisiana.

A private service will be held at Sparkman Hillcrest Cemetery. Remembrances may be made in the form desired by friends.

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.Sparkman-Hillcrest.com for the Parrish family.