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Pearl M. Reed Obituary

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Pearl M. Reed

Sandusky, OH

August 17, 1919 - October 13, 2021

Pearl M. Reed Obituary

Pearl Middleditch Reed, age 102, passed away peacefully on October 13, 2021, at the home of her younger daughter and son-in-law in Sandusky, Ohio, where she had resided for most of the last decade of her life. 

Born August 17, 1919, in rural Lapeer County, Michigan, to Michael Oliver and Mary (Falconbury) Middleditch, Pearl graduated from Lapeer High School and from the Moody Bible Institute of Chicago.  From 1945 to 1950 she served on the mission field with African Inland Missions as a teacher at a girls’ school in Kenya.  Upon her return to Michigan in 1950 she married James Alva Reed, a school administrator, educator and counselor. She briefly taught at Yeshiva Beth Yehudah elementary school in Detroit. She then served as a librarian’s assistant at the Interlochen Arts Academy in Interlochen, Michigan, where her husband was founding Assistant Director, from 1962 to 1967.  After raising her family, Pearl finally retired from her many years of employment as a clerk for the Detroit Public Library.  In retirement she traveled with her husband and cat, Kisa, in a motor home throughout the continental United States and the Maritime Provinces of Canada, wintering in Harlingen, Texas.  In the course of her life Pearl lived in various locations in Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, including Maple Rapids, Empire, Interlochen, East Detroit (Eastpointe), Kalkaska, and Dearborn, before moving to Sandusky, Ohio, in 2008.  Besides traveling, Pearl enjoyed reading, knitting, quilting and regaling family and friends with stories of her African adventures.

Pearl was preceded in death by her parents; her husband of 47 years, James (1997); elder daughter Jane Alice (2007), three sisters: Ella Lucile (Robinson), Nora Orilla (Sutphen), and twin sister Muriel (Watz).  She is survived by her younger daughter Ruth Ellen (Paul) Birmingham of Sandusky, Ohio; granddaughter Rebecca Anne Birmingham (Michael Mihlbachler) of Denver, Colorado; grandson Peter James (Jessica) Birmingham of Corona, California; by several nieces and nephews, by numerous grand-animals, and by many friends.

There will be no funeral services in Sandusky.  Burial will take place in the Reed family plot at Grand Traverse Memorial Gardens on Veterans Drive, Traverse City, Michigan, at a later date.  Arrangements have been entrusted to the Pfeil Funeral Home, Sandusky, Ohio.   

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Event information can be found on the Official Obituary of Pearl M. Reed.