Virginia Church Cook was born May 16, 1929, in Long Beach, California to David Church and Constance Blatchley. She had two sisters, Constance (Connie) and Cynthia (Cindy) as well as a brother David. She graduated from Nevada City High School in 1947, where her mother was a teacher. She was on the honor roll, editor of The Quill (the yearbook), sang in the chorus and played a variety of sports. As you can see from her picture, she was one of the most beautiful girls in her class.
After graduating, she moved to Sacramento and there met Donald Emmons Cook when they both worked at Lester Motors Ford. They married July 9, 1949, and had three children: Joan, Dan and Duane. After moving to a 2-acre parcel in Fair Oaks, California, Virginia helped her husband, Don, build not only one, but two of their homes. She grew a large garden every year and took advantage of the orange, lemon, almond, and cherry trees on their property. She basically cornered the market on recipes that included almonds! She made the best toffee at Christmas which has ground almonds on top of the chocolate. They raised chickens, rabbits, ducks, peacocks, a donkey (that she took a wild ride on) and a cow (that ate the underclothes off the neighbor’s line).
As their children were growing up, they spent many weekends traveling up and down the Pacific Coast, camping and fishing. Virginia was a good seamstress and was the Sewing Leader for 4-H and helped her children with each of their projects, whether it was raising chickens, rabbits, cooking or sewing. She loved sewing and over the years has produced numerous quilts for her children and grandchildren. Her specialty was machine embroidery for which she won many awards at the county fairs.
Since Don loved fishing and building, he, with the help of Virginia, eventually built a 48-foot steel fishing boat that they lived on and fished from for about five years. Since there was not a lot of room on the boat, she worked in needlepoint as well!
Loving the West Coast, Don and Virginia lived in several places, including Fair Oaks, Sacramento and Vallejo, California; Powell River, British Columbia; and finally Port Hadlock, Washington. In Port Hadlock, Don and Virginia were surrounded by kind and loving friends.
Virginia is survived by their daughter, Joan Rasmusson, of South Jordan, Utah and son, Daniel (and wife Denise) of Sacramento, California. At the time of her death, she had eight grandchildren and 27 great-grandchildren. As the “baby” of her family, she provided a curious sense of misdirection for her siblings. As a wife, she couldn’t have been more supportive and hard-working. As a mother, she was a wonderful teacher and exemplar. And as an individual, she was creative, loved to read and was kind to both herself and others. She believed as she always said, “I’m lucky!”
Virginia donated her body to the University of Utah School of Medicine for education and research.
