Jerry and Linda Butler

Crossing the Dark River, Henderson County, Tennessee Obituaries 1827-1950, Brenda Kirk Fiddler, page 139

Opal Fanning (The Lexington Progress, February 9, 1917) Last Tuesday evening when the hands of the clock pointed to the hour of 7:30, the sad news went over Lexington that after a tragic battle in the household of John H. and Mrs. Ora Fanning, the Death Angel had conquered and claimed for his own, Opal, the beloved daughter and only child of Mr. and Mrs. Fanning. The day of her death the 9th inst., was the 14th anniversary of the birth of the only earthly treasure of eh devoted parents. Opal was born in Scotts Hill, this county, and with her parents came to Lexington eight years ago. Here she grew up and attended school, having reached the first grade in the High School when her last illness seized her about two weeks before her death. She was the light of the household, the idol of her parents, beloved by all. She was bright intellectually, amiable by nature, loving and lovable to her parents, relatives and many friends and had before her the promise of a magnificent womanhood. The writer has often seen her in passing and thought every time how proud of her parents should be, as they were. In her premature death, notwithstanding her parents know that she has gone to a home with God-a home infinitely better than the best the world could give-their grief and sorrow is hard to bear. They will be offered all possible consolation by their relatives and friends, but God alone, through the healing balm of time, can bring to them resignation to the unspeakable sorrow which has befallen them.

The funeral service held in the Southern Methodist Church Wednesday afternoon was one of the saddest occasions we have ever known in our thirty three years in Lexington. The house was packed with a limited number of relatives and friends and acquaintances of the bereft father and mother. The beautiful songs selected were sung by the intermediate choir of the church and Sunday School, of which the dead girl was a member, for Opal herself had been a member of the church since the Culpepper meeting here in the summer of 1915. Rev. J. V. Freeman took for his theme the experience of David in the loss of a child; he preached a really fine, sensible and pathetic sermon. Prof. J. O. Brown, in a tribute to the deceased lass, told how loyal, lovable and obedient she was, that she had never needed correction in school and that her deportment was never marked under perfect: 100. The interment was in Lexington Cemetery and when the mound of earth was made over Opal's last earthly resting place, it was more than covered by as beautiful flowers as we have ever seen. May God heal the wounded hearts of Mr. and Mrs. Fanning and may every relative and friend lend every effort to show them that the world has yet many claims upon them, in the performance of which they can find consolation in their seemingly irreparable loss.