Mary E. Durden

She was an active member of Parkwood Baptist Church serving the youth ministry, and participating in community outreach. She served as President of Southside Junior Women’s Club, was a former Regional Director of Prevent Blindness, and was a retired media specialist for Duval County Schools. She was Queen Mother of the Whoop-De-Doo’s, a chapter of the Red Hats Society.

She is survived by her husband of 51 years, Geroude W. Durden Jr. “Rudy”; three children, G. W. “Whit” Durden III, Julie Durden Sharp and her husband, Greg, Cindy Durden Mullen and her husband, Steve; four grandchildren, Maegan Sharp, Abigail Sharp, Hunter Mullen, Carley Mullen; and a sister, Patricia Ewing Hobbs of Cordele, GA., and a brother, Ernest Ewing of Columbia, SC. She also leaves behind a large and loving extended family, and many close friends. She will especially be missed by the Golden Girls, a group of her life-long childhood friends.

Services will be held Monday, January 2, 2012 at 11am at Parkwood Baptist Church, Jacksonville. Interment will follow in the Chapel Hills Memory Gardens, 850 St. Johns Bluff Road North, Jacksonville, FL 32225. The family will receive friends Sunday, January 1, 2012 from 6pm to 8pm at Hardage-Giddens Chapel Hills Funeral Home. Anyone wishing to make a donation may do so to the Adult Sarcoma Research program through the MD Anderson Cancer Center which may be found at http://www.mdanderson.org/how-you-can-help/adult-sarcoma-research.html.

Words of comfort may be shared with the family at www.hardage-giddenschapelhills.com

Arrangements under the direction of Hardage-Giddens Chapel Hills Funeral Home, Jacksonville, FL. Memorial contributions may be made to http://www.mdanderson.org/how-you-can-help/adult-sarcoma-research.html