In 2013, I reached out to Robert "Boo" Parrish for a tour of my family's cemetery in Ripley, WV. Since I was a child, I had known that my grandfather was from Ripley, West Virginia. I had dreamt that someday I would be able to see where my family came from. Boo immediately put me in touch with John Parrish, whom Boo said was interested in restoring our family cemetery. I reached out to John and you would have sworn we were first cousins not fifth. John said he wanted to work on restoring the Parrish Cemetery and would like to know if I could help. John had a clear vision for our legacy and we began our journey. Two years later, we had over twenty people involved in helping us restore this wonderful family site. John was an amateur genealogists and had written two books on our family. With John's guidance, positive attitude, hard work and love of everything Parrish, we were able to bring this cemetery back to it's original beauty. John never missed a call, meeting or an event for our association. He created the Parrish Family Cemetery Association on Facebook and worked with the state of West Virginia and the IRS to create a 501 3C cemetery foundation. All of this was part of his mission to take care of our cemetery in perpetuity.  Over the next few years, John, his wife Linnie and his sister Paula became much more than distant cousins. They became close family. Sadly, John left us in May of 2019. Prior to his passing, John got out of his sick bed and made it to our late April Cemetery Cleanup Day. He would not have missed it for anything. John, I will miss you more than you will ever know. You were my brother and my cousin. Safe travels old friend. See you on the flip side.

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And the work continues...

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-Rick Parrish