Packard L. Okie ’39

Pack died Oct. 4, 2010, in San Clemente, Calif. His funeral was at St. Clement’s by-the-Sea, which he served from 1982 to 2008 as pastoral-care assistant. The parish hall is named in his honor.

Pack attended Virginia Theological School from 1939 to 1942. He served 10 years as a missionary in Liberia, taking two years off to return to Princeton as acting Episcopal chaplain (1946-1948). Returning to Liberia, he married Mary Collett in 1949.  

In 1954 the Okies (now numbering four) returned to the U.S., where Pack served parishes in Pennsylvania. Their third child was born in 1956. After a long-term ministry in Emmaus, he moved to the small Florida town of Crescent City, where he served both the Episcopal and the Presbyterian churches.

Pack was an accomplished musician, a lover of sailing, and a champion tennis player. In 1954 he recorded and produced the album, Folk Music of Liberia, which remains in print in CD (Smithsonian Folkways label).

Mary died in 1967. In 1970 in the Princeton Chapel, Pack married Florence Carley. He is survived by his wife, three children, three stepchildren, and numerous grandchildren. To them all, the class extends its sympathy.