Iris A. Meyer

Anna Iris Ray Meyer, 92, died Thursday, July 14, 2011 at the home of her daughter Linda Gail Meyer in Fallston. She was born April 12, 1919, the second of six children born to Grace Reele Young and Champ Leonidas Ray in Newdale, Yancey County, North Carolina.

Iris was particularly known for her sweet, easy going and gentle nature. She was industrious, generous and completely devoted to her family.

She grew up on a farm high in the mineral rich mountains of Western North Carolina where she attended the one-room Boonford School and graduated from Micaville High School in April 1936. She remembered that at their class party they played Monopoly, the new Parker Brothers game that created dreams of riches in those Depression years.

After graduation she continued the job she had throughout school caring for her elderly relatives, then went to work at a knitting mill in Spruce Pine, NC. From there she trimmed threads off the toes of socks at a hosiery mill in Hickory, NC until a fortuitous call in the spring of 1942 from a friend advised her that "high paying" jobs were to be had at the Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Company in Baltimore, MD.

With her friend Fay Thomas, she got on a bus for Baltimore and was hired as a wiring girl, working in the nose cones of "Martin Bombers" on second shift at the Middle River aircraft manufacturer during World War II. She lived in Highland town in Baltimore City with several friends by now from North Carolina and often talked of midnight movies after work, hot humid nights sleeping in Patterson Park and the 24 hour shifts required for the war effort.

She met her husband, Albert C. Meyer, Jr., at the Martin Company and they married in Columbus, Ohio March 3, 1945 after he was drafted. While Al trained at Lockbourne Air Field near Columbus, she worked as a civilian cleaning spark plugs, then worked in a 5 & 10 cent store in Champlain, Illinois when Al was transferred there.

At the end of World War II, they returned to Baltimore, bought a home in Essex and, while Al returned to his job at the Glenn L. Martin Company, Iris worked as a homemaker, raising their two daughters and canning and freezing produce from their backyard garden. They were active members of the Essex United Methodist Church.

In 1964 she began work at the Maryland Department of Motor Vehicles in the vehicle records and certification department. She worked at the Glen Burnie facility until 1977 when she transferred to the Aberdeen office in Harford County, where she took driver's license photos. She retired May 1, 1981 with nearly 17 years of service.

In 1975, Iris and Al had moved to Fallston, MD where they joined the Fallston United Methodist Church. Iris particularly enjoyed her activities with the "Busy Bees" senior group there.

In the years after her husband's death in 1998, Iris lived in New Freedom with her daughter and son-in-law, then at Country Meadows, York, PA, Bonnie Blink, Hunt Valley, MD and finally with her youngest daughter in Fallston, MD.

She is survived by daughters, Linda Gail Meyer, Fallston MD and Doris Jean Tobias and her husband Ray W. Tobias, Jr., New Freedom PA; her beloved grandchildren Thomas W. Tobias and wife Jennifer, Stewartstown, PA, Laura A. Nagel and husband Jimmy, Stewartstown, PA, and Scott Tobias and fiancée Liz Cady, Stafford and Fredericksburg, VA. She is also survived by three great-grandchildren, Jordan and Brayden Nagel and Alexander Tobias. She is survived by her brother Charles Ben Ray and wife Sandy of Cumming, GA and two sisters-in-law, Dorothy Berger Meyer, Kent, OH, and Virginia Bradshaw Ray, Charlotte, NC, and many cousins, nieces and nephews.

In lieu of flowers, remembrances may be made to the Organ Fund of the Fallston United Methodist Church, 1509 Fallston Road, Fallston, MD.