YARMOUTH – Julia Clarke, who was a creative stay-at-home mother and active member of the Yarmouth community, died Friday at the age of 90.

Her son Peter Clarke called her the “last of her breed,” considering Mrs. Clarke to have been an old-fashioned woman who was totally devoted to her family.

“Not just her children,” he said. “She and my father were soul mates for 65 years. I’m sure it was love at first sight and that never changed.”

Mrs. Clarke met her husband, David Clarke, on a blind date when she was driving ambulances for the Red Cross in St. Louis during World War II and he was stationed nearby.

The couple started their family while he was working in New York City. It was a job advertised in the Wall Street Journal that brought the Clarkes to Maine in 1967.

While in Yarmouth, Mrs. Clarke became involved in the community through her volunteer work with the Yarmouth Health Council and Yarmouth Farm and Garden.

“They always wanted to give back to the town,” Sally Hassey said.

Having designed costumes for local theater when she was younger, Mrs. Clarke used those skills to design Halloween costumes for her children.

“She made this amazing costume,” Hassey said. “It looked like a pile of leaves.”

Mrs. Clarke’s creative talent exincluded inventing games for her children on long car rides and creating themes and planning parties for their birthdays.

When another daughter Nancy Brewer was in college, Mrs. Clarke visited for family weekend and sat in on one of Brewer’s math classes.

“One thing we were doing was some exponent,” Brewer said, and during the class, her mother crocheted the equation they were learning on a small square and gave it to her at the end of the class. “She was very creative.”

Mrs. Clarke’s husband died Nov. 6. Her son described his parents’ relationship as “a model of a great marriage.”

Peter Clarke, who said he has been married to his wife Mary Clarke for almost 34 years, learned a lot from his parents’ marriage.

“I wouldn’t say every year was wine and roses. Raising five children wasn’t easy, but they did a great job raising us and stayed together,” he said. “They were always together. It was rare to see them apart.”

While she was remembered as an incredible cook by her son David Clarke, he said there was just one thing she could not do.

“She couldn’t make coffee,” he said, adding her husband, who could not cook at all, made coffee for her every day. “She could make a five-course dinner for 20 people, but she couldn’t make coffee.” 

Staff Writer Emma Bouthillette can be contacted at 791-6325 or at: ebouthillette@pressherald.com

 

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