Obituary of John Perry Parker

John Perry Parker, age 78, passed away peacefully on October 30, 2016 at his home in Yuba City that he had lived in for the last 39 years. John was born and lived his whole life in the Marysville and Yuba City areas outside of his time serving in the US Army after high school. John is survived by his son, Rob(bie) Parker, from Washington State and his wife Ali and two terrific grandchildren, Cole and Kyla. John was proceeded in death by his loving wife of 53 years, Kay and his son, James, of Williams, CA. John was also preceded in death by his parents Perry Parker of Marysville and Zada Cardinal of Sacramento. John graduated from Marysville HS in the class of '56 before going on to join the US Army where he spent time in Hawaii and Oakland, CA. He met Kay while he was in the Army and they married right after he was honorably discharged in 1962. They immediately started a family and settled in Yuba City which is where they remained to this day. John had a passion for cars and an incredible gift for anything mechanical. He pursued a career as a mechanic specializing large construction equipment starting out with the "family" business in Marysville, H. Earl Parker Construction. After staying there for many years, he moved to Baldwin Construction in Marysville before finally ending his career with Teichert Construction in Davis, CA. His love of cars provided the passion for his favorite hobby; buying, selling, restoring and repairing all varieties of cars. His taste ranged from restoring a Model A to buying a DeLorean. He was an ardent GM/Chevy guy who would be proud to say he never owned a Ford...His last project was restoring a 1967 Chevy C10 pickup that he still prizes and continued to restore with his best friend who had the sister truck even after his health prevented him from working on it himself. In addition to his passion for cars, John loved the outdoors and spent much of his time with his family camping, fishing and four-wheel trekking through the Sierra Nevada's in the Gold Lake region and beyond. He and his family also spent many weekends at Englebright Lake water skiing and houseboating. For those that knew and loved him, John, was a soft-spoken man of few words, who set an incredible example of how to work hard, always do the right thing and be a great role model for his children, co-workers and everyone who met him. He will be greatly missed, but we are comforted to know that he is now in peace back with his wife, Kay. An informal graveside memorial service will be held on Saturday, Nov. 5th, at 10:00am at Sierra View Memorial Park in Olivehurst.