Pauline Cottingham's Obituary
On Monday, February 12, 2024, Pauline Cottingham passed on from this life to her next.
Pauline was born in Greenbackville, Virginia April 17, 1926, to Emma and Seymore Lang, where she grew up with her siblings Hilton, W. Carlton, Mary, and Rachel on their family farm. She attended Greenbackville and Franklin Elementary Schools in Virginia, eventually graduating from Snow Hill High School in Maryland. Pauline went to Goldey-Beacom College, Wilmington, DE, where she received her AA degree. After College, she returned to Snow Hill, MD, and started working as a teller and eventually head teller at the Maryland National Bank. While working there, she met and befriended Wilson Cottingham, who would introduce his son, a returning veteran from WW 2, and the eventual love of her life, William “Fowler” Cottingham, to Pauline. After dating, they married and bought a home in Snow Hill. Shortly after, she gave birth to two screaming rugrats, Gary and Carl Cottingham, five years apart, starting in 1953. In 1962, the family moved to Rehoboth Beach, DE, where she lived the rest of her life. After the loss of Fowler, she devoted her life to taking care of her older siblings and to the family church, Westminster Presbyterian. She served as a session member, an elder, a deacon, in the Women’s Circle, and part of the Presbytery. For more than 30 years she planned church luncheons and scheduled and arranged all the flowers for the church. She was also involved in the Sussex Garden Club, where she could indulge her lifelong love of flowers and plants. There was never a more caring and supportive Wife, Mother, or Grandmother than Pauline.
She is preceded in death by her husband, William "Fowler" Cottingham, and her siblings, Hilton Lang, W. Carlton Lang, Mary Timmons, and Rachel Chapman. She is survived by her sons Gary F. Cottingham and his wife Kathy, and Carl L. Cottingham and his wife Joanne; her grandchildren Gary Cottingham Jr. and his wife Angie, John Cottingham, and Jillian Cottingham; Great grandchildren Chase and Blake Cottingham and unofficially adopted grandchildren William and Kara Collins.
Services for Pauline will be held on Friday February 23, 2024, at 11:00 Am. at Westminster Presbyterian Church, 301 King Charles Avenue, Rehoboth Beach, DE., where visitation for friends and family will begin at 10:00 AM.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the American Cancer Society www.cancer.org
or
Wesminster Presbyterian Church
301 King Charles Avenue
Rehoboth Beach, DE 19971
Please visit Pauline's Life memorial at parsellfuneralhomes.com
FLORIST NOTE: PLEASE DELIVER ALL ARRANGEMENTS BY 3:00 PM ON THURSDAY FEBRUARY 22, 2024, TO OUR LEWES LOCATION.
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