Lolaine “Lainey” Meeker Rodes

Lolaine “Lainey” Meeker Rodes

Fayetteville, Tenn.

A funeral service for Mrs. Lolaine “Lainey” Meeker Rodes of Fayetteville, Tenn., will be held at 11 a.m. on Friday, Sept. 8, 2023, at Higgins Funeral Home with Dee Edwards officiating. Burial will follow in Old Orchard Cemetery. Visitation with the family will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, at Higgins.

Mrs. Rodes was born on June 23, 1925, to Walter Lane Meeker and Lola Elaine Howard Meeker in Perry, Iowa (north of Des Moines). She passed away Sept. 3, 2023, in Vanderbilt-Tullahoma Harton Hospital, a proud 98 years old. By 1931 the family had moved from Perry to Mitchell, S.D., where Lainey started first grade. Sister, Veeta Kay Meeker, was born in Mitchell where their father worked for Standard Brands. Mr. Meeker opened and operated Egg Breaking Plants. Standard Brands moved the family to Goff, Kan., and then Horton, Kan., where Lainey finished the first grade. She attended Sylvan Park Elementary School in Nashville from 1933 to 1936. Their home from that time still stands in Nashville today. The family moved to Petersburg in 1936 where her father and an associate opened a Cheese Plant, MarLin Dairies on Richmond Highway just at the north edge of town. Lainey started sixth grade at the old Elizabeth College building. Many of her sixth-grade classmates also graduated from Morgan School together in 1943. Lainey attended Junior High School in Nashville before returning to Petersburg in 1939.

At Morgan School, Lainey met and dated Doug Rodes. After Doug’s three years in the Navy, they married on Sept. 1, 1946. Lainey had trained with the Cadet Nurses Corps at The University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa, until then. Doug enrolled in Tennessee Technological University and graduated with an Electrical Engineering degree in 1950. After moving to Iowa to be near Lainey’s parents, Doug was hired by Collins Radio (later Rockwell and finally Boeing) in Cedar Rapids. He worked there for 37 years designing and building communications equipment for the military. Upon retiring, the family moved back south and lived for 35 years in Fayetteville. Both Doug and Lainey worked diligently to organize the Morgan/Petersburg Reunions for many years. Lainey was involved with Lincoln County Genealogical Society even serving as its Treasurer for a time, until 2005. It was Lainey’s delight to mail real letters to family and friends all over the country. And if she knew your birthday, watch for your card from her!

Survivors include her daughters, Eva Gail Dahm (Mary Zadrozny) and Rebecca Rodes Dietrich (Roe); grandchildren, Aubrey Dietrich Generose and Doug Dietrich (Kim Terrell); great-granddaughter, Raina Generose; and several nieces and nephews. In addition to her parents, she was preceded in death by her husband, William Douglas Rodes; and her sister, Veeta Kay Ramsey. Higgins Funeral Home is honored to serve the family of Mrs. Lolaine Meeker Rodes.