Shirley (Buckler) Pirkle

Ancestors

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Family Life 1.2 Death and Memorial 2 Sources

Biography

Shirley Ann Buckler was born on 8 Feb 1939 to Freda (Schuhmacher) Buckler and Joseph Robert Buckler living at R.F.D. 3 in Hartford City, Licking Township, Blackford, Indiana, USA. ^[1][2][3]

Siblings:

• Joseph Buckler
• Shirley (Buckler) Pirkle
• Mary (Buckler) Pierce
• Carl Buckler
• Nyla (Buckler) Campbell
• Betty Lou Buckler

In 1940, little Shirley Ann was 14 months and 3 days on her first census! Big brothers was 4 years and 3 weeks old. Dad Robert was 30 and Mom Freda was 25. Dad had an eighth grade education and Mom had finished her freshman year of high school. Robert was working on his own account renting the farm for $14 a month. district 5-12 Washington Township, Blackford, Indiana.He worked 52 weeks in 1939 for no income and worked 40 hours the week prior to the census. Her grandparents Lena and Adam Schuhmacher lived nextdoor.^[4]

In 1950, Shirley was 11 living west of Bruns Road in Washington, Blackford, Indiana on a farm still nextdoor to Grandma and Grandpa. She was in fifth grade. Dad, 40, Mom 36, Joe 14, Shirley 11, Mary Alice 4, and Carl 2 yrs 3 mos were in the home. Dad owned the operation and was credited with working 70 hours a week, Mom and 14 year old Joe were called farm helpers credited with 14 hours a week of work^[5]

Shirley Ann Buckler she and a man named Donnie Pirkle both atteneded Kathleen High School in Kathleen, Florida. He was a year older. He claimed he met her falling from of her family's Pine Valley Dairy ceiling where she worked and he and his father were hired to do repairs.^[6][7]

Family Life

Shirley, parents Robert & Freda Schuhmacher Buckler, grand Lena Amrhein Schuhmacher, dau. Freda. Jun 1959

They married 11 Jan 1958 moving onto Pine Valley Dairy II on the County Line Road where Interstate 4 was being built. It was the site of the family farm that was moved to Old Highway 92, to be called Pine Valley Dairy I.^[8]

Her brother, Joseph Buckler married Donnie's sister Shirley Estelle (Pirkle) Buckler. Therefor, Joe and Shirley Estelle's five children and Shirley Ann and Don's four children became double-first cousins with the same ancestors.

That year their family started.

• Freda (Pirkle) Carey 1958
• DrO (Pirkle) Olmstead 1960
• Bobby Pirkle 1961
• Faith (Pirkle) Shelby Clark 1964

Their first home on County Line Road and I-4 between Lakeland and Plant City. May 1961. Phyllis @ 8 m.. Freda @ 2 y 5 m.

They lived in a hired hand house on her parent's Pine Valley Dairy II on County Line Road, Hillsborough County, Florida. Don worked as a hired hand for her father.

Shirley taught her children to be good citizens and doting parents by enrolling them in all types of organizations and supported them and attending the organizations with them. She followed through with her grandchildren in the same manner. Freda and Phyllis were in Brownies and Girls Scouts where she was a leader. She put Bobby in Boy Scouts and the entire family participated. She entolled him in the YMCA for a while, also. She led 4-H clubs and the children were members for every year they were eligible and participated all year long in every field they could handle.

Don, Freda, Bobby, Shirley Ann Phyllis, Faith Ann. Lakeland, Florida 1966

Typical as it is for most farms, farmers are dual-vocationed. Shirlely was multi-vocationed. She was a federal census taker, sat on a grand jury, sold Avon, ball-point paints, decorated very elaborate cakes, an incredible seamstress, and worked for Montgomery-Wards corporation for decades as a furniture department salesperson. People at MW kept up with her family from the 70s through her death from all over the USA.

They bought a ranch on N State Road 98 for their family. They subdivided the ranch as North Glen Subdivision, naming the roads after the family members. The county sign maker misspelled the main road Perkle!

Don became a real estate agent in Lakeland, a Jaycee, and Chamber of Commerce member. Shirley became an agent and joined him at the agency. After working for others for years, he then became a real estate broker and opened Don Pirkle Realty. Shirley ran his office and handled the books as he was legally blind.

During the 1980s and 1990s she raised amazing roses in her yard. She had upto 50 bushes from O. F. Nelson's and Sons Roses. She spent hours every week out there working on them.

After her son-in-law died in Feb 2006, they decided to not put off their retirement goal of moving to Tennessee and bought a large ranch in Nunnelly, temporarily living in a house in Centerville as the residence at the farm was built.

Having been hale and healthy her entire life, Shirley Buckler Pirkle discovered she had breast cancer while living in Tennessee and returned to Lakeland a short while for surgery and treatment. She was extremely positive about outcome. Her sister-in-law Shirley Pirkle Buckler had breast cancer surgery and treatment at the same time but eventually succumb in April 2013 after a relapse.

Shirley was on hospice at her son's farm in during 2023. She had a fun puppy named Snoopy living with her in her trailer. They spent their days enjoying the sun and the animals together. Her daughter-in-law Joy Ann Baker Pirkle was her primary caregiver for the advancing effects of Parkinson's Syndrome and Alzheimers.

Death and Memorial

Towards the end of October 2023, Shirley was admitted to Hospice House Lakeland. She received last rights from a preist from Saint Anthony's.

Her daughter Phyllis stayed with her the final nine days. Other family members made visits.

She slipped off peacefully in the afternoon of October 29, 2023 in the presence of her daughter.

She was cremated and the family held a memorial service in Lakeland, Florida.

Sources

1. ↑ Indiana Archives and Records Administration; Indianapolis, Indiana; Birth Certificates; Year: 1939; Roll: 003
2. ↑ First-hand information as remembered by her daughter Phyllis DrO Olmstead, Saturday, April 4, 2015.
3. ↑ 1940 US Fed Census Washington, Blackford, Indiana; Roll: m-t0627-01027; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 5-12, Description: WASHINGTON TOWNSHIP, DUNDEE, 11 Apr
4. ↑ 1940 US Fed Census Washington, Blackford, Indiana; Roll: m-t0627-01027; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 5-12, Description: WASHINGTON TOWNSHIP, DUNDEE, 11 Apr
5. ↑ National Archives at Washington, DC; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Year: 1950; Census Place: Washington, Blackford, Indiana; Roll: 3340; Page: 71; Enumeration District: 5-21; Description: Washington township - That part south of the section line from the northeast corner of section 24, Township 24, Range 10 to the northwest corner of section 19, Township 24, Range 10, April 13
6. ↑ Kathleen High School Yearbooks, 195 and 1957, personal copies
7. ↑ Personal Knowledge and Interviews, Daughter and biographer, Pirkle-96
8. ↑ Florida, Marriage Indexes, 1822-1875 and 1927-2001, 2006, cert 1850, Vol 1714

See also:

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