He is survived by his brother Herman “Hap” (Lisa Okoniewski) Parker of Flourtown, PA; niece Suzanne Parker of Utah; sister-in-law Karen Okoniewski of Buffalo, and many friends in the Livonia Community. Ralph owned and operated the Livonia Inn and the Livonia Lumber Company for most of...
As an exchange student in Utah in 1980, when the hosting family father confirmed that he still thought black people was inferior though the church of the latter day saints had ackowledged a few years earlier that black people were not inferior to white people. I realized he was racist and...
Surviving are his father and stepmother, James and Betty Jackson of Caldwell County; his mother and stepfather Mary and Dwayne Larkins of Eddyville; maternal grandmother, Virginia Curry of Eddyville; paternal grandmother, Maude Teague of Princeton; step-grandfather, Luther Ramage of Princeton; two br...
He went on to write for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and the Bradenton Herald (1977-1985), before moving across the country to the Bay Area to become the Alameda County bureau chief for The San Jose Mercury News. After 20 years as a reporter and editor for “the Merc,” he left with ...