February 16, 1934 - March 11, 2022
Home at Last Robin Elizabeth Hunter Alford Adams, age 88, passed away March 11, 2022 at the Good Samaritan Society Spokane Valley. Robin Elizabeth, daughter of Bertha P. (Smith) and Charles M. Hunter, was born in Galveston, TX on February 16, 1934 at John Sealy Hospital. Bert M. Alford, adopted Robin following the death of her father Charles. The Alford family called Lawton, OK home although they moved often due to Bert’s military service. When in 10th Grade, Robin and her mother joined her father in Tokyo, Japan. Robin graduated from Tokyo American School in Meguro in 1952 where she met her future husband, Edward B. Adams. The first to attend college in her family, Robin enrolled at Oklahoma State University her Freshman year. At the end of the year, Robin transferred to Whitworth College, Spokane, WA. Robin married Edward Adams on the Whitworth campus June 5, 1955. They both graduated from Whitworth with teaching degrees in 1957. They taught in elementary schools in the Spokane area at Otis Orchards, Nine Mile, and the university school at Central Valley. Their oldest child, Jonna, was born in Spokane, WA in 1956. Robin accompanied Ed overseas in 1959, with the Department of Defense, taking elementary school teaching positions on military bases in Taiwan (1959), Japan (1961), and Korea (1965-1975). Three more children were born into the family while in Asia: Rob, Kim, and Dick. Robin taught Kindergarten, 2nd, 5th, and 6th grades. While in South Korea, Robin authored a translation of a Korean folk tale, The Rabbit Visit the Dragon King. The family traveled throughout South, Korea. Besides serving as President of the Protestant Women of the Chapel, Robin was a Sunday School teacher and Bible study leader, Camp Mount-O-Pines board member, and regular volunteer in local orphanages. In 1973, Robin supported Ed in his dream of building an international school in Seoul, South Korea (Seoul International School). In 1976, Robin returned to the United States with her three youngest children and settled in Edmonds, WA following a divorce. Robin found work in a local school and a faith-based women’s organization. She lived in Edmonds, WA area until 1982, which she named her “year of change” when she sensed a call to go to Japan as a missionary. The following year, 1983, Robin moved to Nara, Japan and worked in a local church and Christian center, supporting herself by teaching English and Bible. Robin served in Japan for nearly 20 years. Robin retired from her work in Japan and settled first in rural Sebeka, MN and then near Frazee, MN. Around 2012, Robin moved to Rathdrum, ID. After experiencing a stroke in 2015, Robin lived in several facilities around the Coeur d’Alene area until her move to the Good Samaritan Society Spokane Valley. Robin is survived by her four children, Jonna (Gary) Goreham, Detroit Lakes, MN; Rob (Ann) Adams, Rathdrum, ID; Kim Adams, Chino Valley, AZ; Dick (Jane) Adams, Midlothian, VA, 10 grandchildren (Jessica and Julie, Ryan, Nathanael and Lilie, Andrew, Benjamin, Angela, Sarah, and David), eight great grand children, and two sisters-in-law, (Junko Rounds & Ruthann Metcalf.) She is preceded in death by her parents Charles Hunter, Bert and Bertha Alford, and two brothers, Leon Rounds and Charles Rounds. A memorial service will be held June 11th in the Wichita Mountains near Lawton, Oklahoma, and a celebration of life service will be held at Candlelight Christian Fellowship in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho on April 1, 2022, 10 AM. It will be streamed at www.candlelight.org/listen-watch And how blessed all those in whom you live, whose lives become roads you travel; They wind through lonesome valleys, come upon brooks, discover cool springs and pools brimming with rain! God-traveled, these roads curve up the mountain, and at the last turn—Zion! God in full view! ~Psalms 84:5-7
