Aldean Sharp

October 17, 1928 – May 7, 2022

Vacaville, CA

Mom was a force of nature, appropriately born in tornado alley. She was a wife, mother, grandmother and friend, a teacher, farmer, volunteer extraordinaire, and a woman of deep and abiding faith. She was a vibrant character who loved good humor and long stories.

Born Frances Aldean Craig on October 17, 1928, to Annabelle (Handley) and Harry Harrison Craig, Sr. in Picher, OK, she grew up playing in the ‘chat piles’ left behind from the town’s zinc and copper mines. Some years later, the EPA decided that was a bad idea, and turned the town into a Superfund site. Apparently, she came out unharmed.

Following their move a few miles down Route 66 to a home lovingly built by her father in Commerce, OK, she sang soprano in the high school choir, acted in school plays, and played the drum in the marching band. Years later on a local TV show, when she confronted her younger schoolmate Mickey Mantle about his efforts to steal her drumsticks, he said, “Deannie, it wasn’t your drumsticks I was after.” She loved telling that story.

She made her way to Oklahoma City after high school, training to become a teacher at Central State College. She worked her way through school as a switchboard operator for the phone company, as a dorm matron, and somewhere in there as the teacher at the one-room South Brown School in Neodesha, KS, her first teaching job in a career that would span some fifty years.

While at Central State, she met a young farmer and fellow student from Rush Springs named Melvin Anderson Sharp. After a whirlwind courtship, he asked her to marry him at the Rose Garden in OKC. She didn’t answer. Luckily for him – and for the rest of us – a few weeks later, she took him to see the new Debbie Reynolds movie, “I Love Melvin,” using the movie as her answer. They were married in her parents’ backyard on July 31, 1953.

They launched their formal teaching careers together in Perry, OK, welcoming their first son, Craig, two years later. They moved next to Kit Carson, CO, and finally to Vallejo, CA in 1958, where she began teaching at Olympic Elementary School. Her teaching career in Vallejo would take her to Cooper, Dan Mini, Steffan Manor, Federal Terrace, Pennycook, and Highland, where she retired in 1991. She continued substitute teaching well into her retirement.

She found her love of community engagement in Vallejo in the 1950s, with the First Methodist Church, Friendship Club, Gideons Auxiliary, College Women’s Club, Boy Scouts and many other local organizations, holding countless fundraisers and events in their home on Greenfield Avenue. They met their dear friends, Newt and Mabel Kerr and Opal and Ping Banger, spending holidays, summers, and weekends together with all the families for decades. They welcomed three more sons – Martin, Mark, and Dan – over the next decade, and then decided to buy a farm in Gordon Valley.

The small-town girl embraced life on the walnut farm, raising her younger sons in 4-H and even joining the board of Diamond Walnut. She loved everything that came with farm life – staying at the fairs for the livestock auctions, farm bureau dinners, pioneering ways to sell from a small farm straight to market well ahead of what we now call “farm-to-table.”

Mom’s retirement in 1991 was cut short when, soon after their first weeks-long retirement trip together, Dad was tragically killed in a farming accident. But she just dug deeper into her volunteer work at Kaiser, racking up thousands of hours, along with holding down just about every possible lay member position at Community United Methodist Church in Fairfield. She added to her volunteer roster many leadership positions at Meals on Wheels, CA Retired Teachers Association, AAUW, volunteering as a poll observer on Election Days and spending as much time as possible with family and friends.

She was still driving and living independently at 91, but the inability to socialize during Covid ultimately took the biggest toll on her health, and she was not happy about it.

She made memories and left memories. She was very much a product of a different time but encouraged us to live in our own. She left an impression on everyone who ever met her – it was impossible for her not to. She struck up a conversation with perhaps every person in swinging distance of those canes, and was never, ever shy.

Mom’s family and friends were important to her, as was her faith that she lived out through her service to others. While she lived an incredibly full life these past 31 years, she missed Dad, and she was ready to see him again. We are all comforted by the fact that they’re back together, and in the loving embrace of the Lord.

She leaves behind her sons, Mark (Georgia) and Dan (Amy); granddaughter, Mary and grandsons, Chris, Zackery, Andrew, and Jakob; sister, Ann (Rev. J. Paul Lewis); along with many nieces and nephews. She was preceded in death by her husband, Melvin; sons, Craig (Jessie) and Martin; granddaughters, Korry and Rachael; and her brother. Rev. Harry H. Craig, Jr. (Barbara.)

Services will be held this Saturday, May 14, 2022, in the Sanctuary at Community United Methodist Church, 1875 Fairfield Avenue in Fairfield. A viewing will be held at 10 a.m., and at 11 a.m., Rev. Anne Choy will lead a Celebration of her remarkable life. A reception will be held immediately following at Mankas Grill, 2522 Mankas Corner Road in Suisun Valley. As she would want, all are welcome.

In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to Meals on Wheels or spend some time volunteering in your community and think of her.