John Parke

John Parke, formerly of Concord, Massachusetts, passed away Friday, June the 26th at his home in Partlow, Virginia. 

John was born at Emerson Hospital on Columbus Day, October 12, 1959; son of the late John Henry Parke and Anna (nee Luhaink) Parke of Concord. 

John grew up with his parents and four siblings in the historic Timothy Minot House on Bedford Street, across from Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. Johnny’s father, John Henry “Goo-Goo” Parke taught him a love of nature early in his life, taking Johnny out by canoe to tend raccoon trap lines on the Concord and Sudbury Rivers. 

Summers for the family were spent at Bourne Scenic Park, overlooking the Cape Cod Canal. With clam bakes, sunburns and sand between your toes, those were classic New England summers for the family. Johnny boasted that his father could cast a striper plug all the way across the canal. Young John caught the fishing bug and was a saltwater and freshwater angler all his life. 

Moving to Virginia in the late 1970s, Johnny met and married his wife, Nancy Weyant, who survives him after forty-one years of marriage. When not working as a carpenter, or fishing on the local lakes, John played guitar and sang for nursing homes and other groups of lonely people. He played in the band at his beloved Mount Olive Baptist Church in Partlow where he is remembered for soulful and emotional renditions of traditional Christian hymns. Popular as a boy and again as a man, he will be greatly missed by many. 

John is survived by his wife, Nancy Weyant; a brother, Dana of Bourne, Massachusetts; and a sister, Leslie Whitehead of Hubbardston, Massachusetts; and the many wonderful people in Virginia that he considered his family. He is predeceased by his parents, his sister, Audrey Barrington Christian and his sister, Jacqueline Parke-Hayward.

May He Rest in Peace.

A celebration of life will take place in Virginia later this summer or early fall.