THE HAND HOLDERS

We must mention several persons who contributed to the family.

Foremost are the parents of Don's wife, Natalie DeBlasio Kirkman. Her father, Alex (Alessandro) DeBlasio, was born August 20, 1898 in Terrano Nuovo, Italy (east of Rome in the Apennine Mountains).
He was the only son of Pasquale and Diamante DiBlasio, a family of petty nobility, and had six sisters.A strong and tempestuous personality, Alex fled to the United States in 1916 after participating in an illegal anti-World War I demonstration in Rome. In 1918, he was drafted into the U.S. Army but allowed to return home to avoid the infuenza epidemic.

Alex married in 1922, fathered a son, Pat (Pascal) DeBlasio (now living in Maui, Hawaii), but his wife died in childbirth. He then married Emilda Petrarca of New Kensington, PA and Youngstown, OH.

A contractor, Alex built many homes and commercial and public buildings in the Youngstown area. He and Millie had three daughters: Dina (born Dec. 8, 1924), Gloria (March 2, 1928), and Natalie. He succumbed to a heart attack on April 8, 1972.

Alex’s wife Millie, the rock of the DeBlasio family, was born July 6, 1901 in New Kensington, PA, the second of 11 children of Celestino Petrarca and Enrichetta D’Amico. Celestino moved to Youngstown and published the city’s Italian-American newspaper and Millie worked for it as a young woman. A family joke has it that Grandpa Celestino’s editorials were wop-sided..A remarkable woman, Millie DeBlasio was admired by all who knew her. She died of a heart attack on Jan. 2, 1980. She and Alex are buried in Youngstown.

werhsepa.gif (1260 bytes)

A charming addition to the Kirkmans is Ken’s wife, Sheri Blevins Kirkman of Burke, VA, the only child of Robert Jerry Blevins and Shelby Jean Hardy Blevins both of Gary, WV and Annandale.

Sheri’s father, an Army paratrooper, married Shelby Jean at Ft. Bragg, NC and they moved to Falls Church, VA after Robert left the Army. Robert worked for the Central Intelligence Agency but contracted throat cancer and died at Fairfax (VA) Hospital on July 28, 1978 (age 37). He's buried in Princeton, WV.

Shelby Jean was the daughter of Woodrow Hardy, a coal miner, and Ethelyne Hardy, a nurse, of Hay, WV. She graduated from Gary High School, attended Concord College in Athens, WV and married Robert in 1966. She was a GS-14 in the Navy's accounting department, but contracted leukemia in 1982. She died on Feb. 29, 1984 and also was buried in Princeton, WV.

Sheri dropped out of high school to care for her fatally stricken mother, later achieved her high school diploma and married Ken Kirkman in 1984. She’s the organizational cog in Ken’s home repair business and a teacher in a Fairfax County pre-school.

werhsepa.gif (1260 bytes)

Janis Gail Marks-Kirkman, a cheerful redhead from Miami, FL, joined the family on May 10, 1997 when she married Christian William Kirkman V.

The daughter of airline pilot Marvin David Marks of Hartford, CT and Bernice Greenstein Marks of Boston, MA, Janis was mostly raised in Miami, graduated from its Killian High School, attended Miami Dade Community College, and won an Associate Science degree in Social Studies (Magna Cum Laude) from Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale. Her outstanding performance won her membership in Phi Theta Kappa honorary society.

She spent 15 months (1977-79) in the Air Force, stationed at the Strategic Air Command’s missile complex at Ellsworth Air Force Base, Rapid City, SD, and has been a secretary in Florida and Virginia. Currently, Janis is an executive secretary at Northern Virginia Training Center, Fairfax, VA.

A lady with many strings in her bow, Janis took ballet and played piano, flute and guitar. She and Chris are NASCAR buffs and spend many weekends as pit crew members for the Gaston Racing Team which in 1997 fielded the top car at The Old Dominion Speedway in Manassas, VA. Janis also is a volunteer for Attention Deficit Disorder research.