MEEKIE RUTH HERRINGTON KING, the youngest child of Doris Rice Herrington (RHS-1937) and Phelton Herrington, was born February 1, 1953 in Ranger. She graduated in the Class of 1971 from Ranger High School, where she played trombone in an award-winning band.

The family lived on a farm about eight miles north of town at the intersection of the Caddo and Strawn highways. Along with her two brothers and her mother, Meekie took a big share of the responsibility for such a little girl. She was not yet four years of age when the structure of the family changed making her mother and siblings solely responsible for the dairy farm's operation. They left the farm in September 1960 just as she was beginning the second grade at Hodges Oak Park.

She continued to have to be unusually self-reliant as her older brother Mike left home for college in 1961 and her other brother Eddie Ray worked long hours at a service station on Highway 80. Immediately after graduation, she moved to Albuquerque, where Mike, newly married, taught in the public schools & where her mother had just relocated.

Albuquerque was to become her primary home as an adult. Among the various jobs she held while living there, the one she loved the most was driving a school bus, especially for special needs children. In 1972 she married David C. King, a chiropractor and part-time musician. They had one son, Kevin David. Later the couple divorced.

At age 35 on July 2, 1988 in Killeen, Texas, she died from a self-inflicted gunshot, leaving behind a very sad family. She was survived by her life partner Kathryn Miller of Killeen; her son Kevin of Killeen; her parents and step-parents, Doris and Paul Garding of Vancouver, Washington and Phelton and Delanie Herrington of Ranger; her brothers Mike (RHS-1960) of Omaha, Nebraska and Edd (RHS-1968) and his wife Sylvia (RHS-1968) of Irving as well as several nephews, nieces, cousins and two aunts. Interment was at Evergreen Cemetery.