Carithers, Rosabelle Pierson (Mrs. Kenneth K.)
5/19/1998
| Known to most of us as “Rose,” she was born on her family’s farm in Owensville, Indiana February 21, 1906. She married K.K. Carithers on June 14, 1928 and shortly after that the two of them went into the ministry of The Methodist Protestant Church through First Church in Princeton, Indiana. She was licensed to preach in 1931 from the Vincennes District of the Indiana Conference. She became a Probationer in 1945 in the Little Rock Conference and was received into Full Connection and ordained Elder in 1955 in the Louisiana Conference. Through the years she and K.K. were appointed to charges as close together as possible. From 1954 – 1967 they served the charges of Bienville–Caster; Sun-Bush; Florien; Donaldsonville-Grand River; Shiloh-Longstreet and Kilbourne-Locust Grove. They lived in all sorts of parsonage arrangements, from having only one parsonage on the charge in which they lived, to having as many as four in which people wanted them to live and sometimes they tried. One of the legacies of their ministry is that fifteen men and one woman went into ministry under their pastoral leadership. She counted those who came from her churches as “hers” and he counted those from his churches as “his.” They counted them all as “theirs.” Two of “hers” were Claude Stone who served in the Arkansas and Missouri Conferences until his death and Jim Constable who served in the Arkansas and Louisiana Conferences until his death. Their wives Dixie Stone and Mildred Constable cared for Rose in her last days as though she was their mother. Being one of “their” boys has brought me to this day remembering the great ministry they offered to us on the Bienville-Castor charge from 1954-1957. Their work with youth was as it should have been in those years and many of us benefited greatly from their love and patience. He was the one of grace and forgiveness and she was the one of law and accountability. They were a great gift to the Church. She was buried in the Odd Fellow Cemetery in Princeton with K.K. |
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| Source: Journal Louisiana Conference 1998, p. 243 By Rev. William D. Peeples | |
