Ardath Evitt Gravesite

Ardath Leona (Shuler) Evitt was born to John Shuler (1874 - 1935) and Stella I (Parker) Shuler (1875 - 1919). She had one sister, Avis Lenora Shuler (1904 - 1993). Ardath Shuler married William Stephen Evitt (1900 - 1967) in the People Tabernacle Methodist Church on August 10 1922 in Paris IL. He was a farm laborer and she was a housewife. They had children including Oren Leon Evitt (born on May 21 1926 in Vermillion Indiana), Bernard A. (1928 - 2007), Madeline (1931 - 1971), Richard Lee Evitt (1947 - 2005) and John Perry Evitt (1932 - 2021). In 1978, Ardath was the oldest person to make a parachute jump for the first time. She was 74 years old and had always wanted to jump from an airplane. Ardath was a great-grandmother at the time and her first attempt on July 24 was thwarted by thunderstorms. But she made it on August 7th! She then appeared on the Johnny Carson show to describe her adventure. (She beat the record of a 69 yr old woman who had jumped the year before.) Watch her interview at Ardath Evitt (parachuting at 74) on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson (8/17/78). After the jump she was quoted in the paper as saying: 'I'll do it again . . . I think anybody who is as old as I am, as long as they can walk and talk and act foolish, might as well have fun." A long article, with a few pictures before she made the jump, appeared in the Chicago Tribune on August 30, 1978. See Ardath L Evitt- Parachute Jumping. She looked so happy!