Daisy Roark, 91, passed away peacefully at Shaw Mountain of Cascadia early Monday morning on June 7, 2021. Daisy was born March 8, 1930 in Oldham County, Kentucky, daughter of Dewey Sparks and Della McSweeny, and sister to Denver, Donald, Dea, Dolly, Dotty, Dixie, Dessie, Dewey and Delaurel. Her family moved from Kentucky to Michigan, and then to the Pacific Northwest, where she attended grade school in Orient, Oregon and high school in Sandy, Oregon.
The children helped support the family by picking berries of all kinds, and when they finished picking a row, they’d take a break and stretch out under the bushes to enjoy the breeze. They also raised chickens, rabbits, pigs, cows, horses and frogs. Daisy didn’t like the frogs and told her sister Dixie she’d get warts playing with them. But Dixie also remembers how she and Daisy would lie in the grass, hold hands, and look to see which of them could find more angels in the clouds. The sisters remained very close throughout their lives, and Dixie was with Daisy when she passed away.
Daisy worked for her brother Dea in his restaurant—Dea’s In and Out, which still operates on Burnside Road in Gresham, Oregon today—for many years during the 1950s. In the 1960s, she moved to Boise and worked at St. Luke’s hospital for several years as a supervisor of food and nutrition. In the 1970s, Daisy raised her two children, Lori and Tony Boyenger, in Boise. She cherished them—and her grandchildren Gabrielle Klem and Jeremy Boyenger—with her whole heart. And now, they’re heartbroken, a testa-ment to their great love for her.
In the early 1980s, she met James (Jim) Roark and they were married June 2, 1982 in Elko, Nevada. Jim was the love of her life. Together, they ran the Viking Motel on State Street in Boise, and later moved to Cascade, Idaho for their retirement. Daisy became part of Jim’s family, and forged a special bond with her Roark family grandchildren: Kim, Jenni, Jake, Raquel, Harrison, and Tanner. To them, she has always been “Grandma Daisy.”
Daisy is preceded in death by her parents, her first husband Rex Boyenger, her husband Jim Roark, many of her siblings, her son Tony Boyenger, and her grandson Harrison Roark. She is survived by her sisters Dixie Hayes and Dessie (Harvey Steele), her daughter Lori (Darren Board), her step-children Lonette (Sam Bushman) and Tony (Heidi Roark), her grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and nieces and nephews and their families, all of whom love Daisy very dearly.
The family would also like to thank Shaw Mountain of Cascadia for their service to Daisy in her final years.