VIRGINIA W. SMYTH
September 11, 1922 - October 16, 2016
CAMDEN, MAINE – Virginia Wigginton Smyth, 94, died peacefully on Sunday morning, October 16, 2016. Her family, friends, and caregivers will miss her.
Virginia was born in Marietta, Ohio on September 11, 1922, to Ellsworth and Carrie Perfect Wigginton. From her childhood, Virginia was quick, competitive, artistic, and musical. She was also a “tomboy” who loved the outdoors and enjoyed many kinds of physical activity, as she would throughout her long life. She attended Marietta College for two years, and then transferred to The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, where she completed a degree in occupational therapy. After enlisting in the WAVES, she worked at the Bethesda, Maryland naval hospital complex, where she cared for sailors just home from World War II who needed to learn how to cope with their damaged or missing limbs, and to perform anew the tasks of daily living. In Bethesda, Virginia met her future husband, William T. Smyth MD, a pathologist. Bill and Virginia were married in May 1949, and she never returned to work in occupational therapy after that. However, her children benefited from their mother’s well-developed crafting skills, her teaching abilities, and her output as a skilled knitter.
Throughout her life, Virginia enjoyed playing duplicate bridge, swimming daily at the local YMCA, downhill skiing, and traveling, visits, and holidays with her Wigginton siblings, and with her four children as they reached adulthood, scattered over the US, married, and raised their own families. Virginia and Bill Smyth were married for forty-eight years, until he died in 1997. In 2002, as her physical health began to decline, Virginia moved to Camden, Maine to be closer to her daughter Mary’s family. Of this final change at the age of 80, she wrote eloquently, “This move must have been timed right for me. I haven’t looked back since starting this newest life of mine here. I love Maine—including its cold winters (which I would really love if I were still skiing). Spring comes slowly—then the idyllic summer that attracts so many here and extends into variable weather in fall ... . Last winter, I missed fewer than 12 days with no walk outside due to weather. I gotta get outside!”
During her gentle, gradual decline caused by the effects of Alzheimer’s and increasing age, Virginia was, and her family remains, exceedingly grateful for the dedication, incredible kindness, and love given by a series of caregivers at PALS for Living and The Courtyard unit at Quarry Hill. After her diagnosis with Alzheimer’s, when Virginia had to move to a supervised setting, her daughter Mary noted that “the drug we chose to treat her with was people.” As a result, Virginia was able to continue her daily outdoor walks or indoor exercise, and competitive games of Scrabble, with her PALS. She was supported by everyone at Quarry Hill, from the maintenance men who greeted her at the gazebo to the kitchen staff who knew her preference for dessert. In her last illness, she was compassionately supported by the doctors and nursing personnel at Pen Bay Hospital and the amazing caregivers at the Sussman House. If Virginia had been able to express herself in these last days, she would have said that she was very lucky to have met all the people who cared for her, during her years in Maine. Each of them deserves the highest praise: they gave generously of themselves, to assist another human being who needed their help. Until the last week of her life, when she fell, broke her hip, and was then unable to recover, Virginia was savoring an occasional chocolate truffle or two, and a seat outdoors in the sunshine. Her ashes will be placed next to Bill’s in the Smyth family burial plot in Pottsville, Pennsylvania.
Virginia loved her children, and she was a beloved playmate for her grandchildren. She was predeceased by her husband of 48 years, Dr. William T. Smyth. Survivors include her children Jane Smyth Bunnell (Prairie Village, KS), Julia Smyth-Pinney (Rome, Italy), David H. Smyth and his wife Elaine (Asheville, NC), and Mary Smyth and her husband Thomas O’Connor III (Rockport, ME); her grandchildren Sarah Bunnell and Erica Bunnell, David Pinney, and Thomas O’Connor V and James O’Connor; and her great granddaughter Hannah Leigh Bunnell, age 7 months.
To share a memory with her family, or to view the full obituary, please visit the website provided by Long Funeral Home, www.longfuneralhomecamden.com. The Smyth family requests that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Sussman House Hospice Care Center, Rockport, ME (https://www.penbayhealthcare.org/sussman-house/ ), to the Penobscot Bay YMCA, Camden, ME (http://www.penbayymca.org/), or to any favorite charity.

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