Barbara Jane (Sipes) Pope Hawkins, aged 92, passed away peacefully in her sleep on July 13, 2020 at Sarah's Care Home in Lancaster, California after a brief battle with cancer. She was born in Moline, Illinois on September 15, 1927 to Artie Miles Sipes and Adelia Mae (Lang) Sipes. She married Fred Leroy Pope, Jr. on June 26, 1946, and later married Kenneth Howard Hawkins on April 21, 1970.

Barbara loved music, reading, traveling, and was an avid counted cross stitcher. In her eighties, she won many blue ribbons and Best in Division for her counted cross stitch artwork at the Antelope Valley Fair in Lancaster, California.

When Barbara was ten years old, she started taking piano accordion lessons. She learned to play an Italian mother-of-pearl 120-bass piano accordion, was a member of the Honolulu Conservatory of Music Accordion Band in 1939 (in Quad Cities, Illinois), and by her teens was playing solos on live radio and teaching music at Bowlby Music House in Rock Island, Illinois. She was also an accomplished pianist who could read chord symbols at sight. Barbara loved education and was the first member of her family to finish high school, graduating from Moline High School in 1945. She later worked for schools and universities in Cincinnati, Ohio; Prairie Village, Kansas; Norman, Oklahoma; and Kansas City, Missouri. She always said educating people was more interesting than making a product.

She lived in Shawnee, and later, Norman, where she worked for O.U. from 1983-1986 as Secretary to the Dean of the College of Business, and Secretary to the Assistant Director of the School of Music. Her daughter Mary Pope

graduated from Shawnee High School in 1981 and went to O.U. Barbara loved music and was a tireless supporter of the Oklahoma Youth Orchestra during its 1981 People's Republic of China performance tour. She retired from Rockhurst University in 1998 at age 70½ and moved with her husband Ken to Seattle, Washington where she lived for ten years, serving for 8½ years as President of Windsong Condominiums and helping her husband run his engineering consulting business, Vibration Control Co. After Ken's death in 2008, she moved to Lancaster, California, and always said she couldn't believe she ended up living in the desert where she remembered some of her favorite childhood westerns were filmed. In her retirement years, she joined the Red Hat Society in Seattle, the DAR in the Antelope Valley, and was an active member of the Leona Valley Ward of the LDS Church for more than 5 years. She was a staunch supporter of Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris in his fight for Section 8 benefits for the elderly, and was very proud of the Commendation she received from the City of Lancaster for her 90th birthday.

She was predeceased by her husbands: Ken Hawkins of Seattle, Washington and Fred Pope of Moline, Illinois; her parents, Artie and Mae Sipes of Moline, Illinois; her brother, Junior Miles Sipes (Olive June Mount) of Austin, Texas; her sisters, Lucille Mary Evans (Howard Frank) and Arline Anna Betcher (Kenneth Otto) of Moline, Illinois; her special cousins: Portia Annette (Sipes) Brierton (John), Gladys Janet (Sipes) Taber (Amos), Delores Jeanene "Dee" (Sipes) Crouse (Robert), and Sandra Jane (Sipes) Chockley (Richard), all of Rushville, Illinois; and her daughter-in-law, Barbara (Dobrzynksi) Pope (Jeffrey Lee) of Warren, Michigan.

She is survived by her three children: Jeffrey Lee Pope (Nancy Rose Clark Storms) of Huntley, Illinois; JoAnn Adelia (Pope) Woolwine (Samuel Clayton, Jr.) of Narrows, Virginia; and Mary Jane (Pope) Hawkins Ritch (Harold "Tony") of Palmdale, California; four grandchildren: Jennifer Lynn (Pope) Jenkins (Gary James) of Hawthorn Woods, Illinois; Samuel Clayton Woolwine, III (Federica "Kika" B. Ciacci) of Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Nathan Edward Woolwine of Narrows, Virginia; and Elizabeth Ann Woolwine of Richmond, Virginia; and nine great-grandchildren in Illinois and North Carolina. She is also survived by a beloved niece, Rozella M. Evans of Moline, Illinois; special cousin, Gwendolyn Marie "Gwennie" (Sipes) Root (George) of Gillespie, Illinois; dear cousin by marriage, Evelyn Synneve (Tillberg) Sebree (Weldon) of Tucson, Arizona and good friend, Merle Bouche of Palmdale, California. She also had 3 step-daughters, 6 step-grandchildren, 12 step-great-grandchildren, and 1 step-great-great grandchild.

There will be no services as she requested cremation by Chapel of the Valley Mortuary in Palmdale, California. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to The Bristol Foundation.