Don Darling

Published 12:00 am Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Graveside services for Don Darling, 80, will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 15, at Oak City Cemetery with the Rev. Andy McQuaid officiating.

Mr. Darling was born in South Ryegate, Vt., the son of Charles B. Darling and Eleanor Frances Andrews Darling, and died Thursday, Oct. 30, 2008, at Lady Lake, Fla.

He served in the U.S. Navy in World War II where he witnessed the first atomic bomb testing on Bikini atoll. He attended the University of Vermont and McGill University in Montreal, Canada, where he met his first wife, Doris Walsh, who preceded him in death after 24 years of marriage. He retired from IBM after 36 years to raise cattle and open his own ceramic shop in Bainbridge and later moved to The Villages in Lady Lake.

Survivors include his wife, Grace Darling of Lady Lake; his daughter, Carole Angell of Bainbridge, Ga.; three stepsons, Matthew Johnson of Virginia, Ernest Johnson of Texas and Kenneth Johnson of Scotland, United Kingdom; eight grandchildren, including Kevin Angell and his wife, Suzanne, and Sydney Heard, all of Bainbridge, and Elizabeth Knox and her husband, Jason, of Edison, Ga.; and 10 great-grandchildren.

In lieu of flowers, donations in his memory may be made to Cornerstone Village Hospice, 601 Casa Bella, The Villages, FL 32162.

Ivey Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.