Beverly Joe (Sherling) Petty

Beverly Joe Sherling Petty, 92, a resident of Summerville, SC, died on September 5th at Summerville Hospital after a brief illness. She was the president of the Mount de Sales High School graduating class of 1949 in Macon, GA; earned a Registered Nurse degree from Armstrong State College in Savannah in 1969; and took two years of additional intensive training to become a Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA) at the old Columbia Hospital in 1972. She then worked for 30 years at hospitals in Columbia, Walterboro, Augusta, and Edgefield. She was the widow of Joe Petty, WSAV TV News Director in Savannah (1963-1968) and WIS TV Sports Director and News Director in Columbia (1968-1981).

Beverly was born in Atlanta and raised in Macon on the Sherling Family farm. Her parents were divorced at a time when divorces were much less common than they are today. She was raised by her mother, Bessie, and her father’s two spinster sisters, Aunts Madge and Snooks, who were eccentric, Mark Twain-type characters direct from Hollywood central casting. These ladies were strong, professional women long before career women and working mothers became the norm. In retrospect, it’s not surprising that Beverly ultimately followed a professional path like her mentors.

Beverly acknowledged that she tended to do things the hard way. After marrying at age 20 and committing to the role of mother by having six children in nine years, at age 37, with children ranging in age from 6 to 15, she returned to school full-time for four years to become an anesthetist. She added student and career professional to her already full-time homemaker responsibilities because her family needed additional income as the kids got older and had to be educated. This Herculean feat reflected her extraordinary determination, energy, and resilience, for which her family is forever grateful.

Known affectionately as Yia-Yia by her grandchildren, Beverly enjoyed reading (mainly biographies and spiritual topics), gardening, traveling, and family history. As Mount de Sales class president, she organized several reunions over the years for the “forty-niners” and served as the communications focal point for keeping up with classmates and the nuns who taught them. She welcomed any occasion to go out for lunch or dinner with family and friends and always insisted on picking up the tab. In her later years, she traveled with family to Ireland, the Grand Canyon, Mount Rushmore, the Crazy Horse Monument, Yellowstone, Zion, Bryce, Canyonlands National Parks, the Great Salt Lake, and Little Big Horn National Monument. She believed strongly in karma – “what goes around comes around” – and was an admirer of the Trappist Monk and writer Father Thomas Merton. In 1955 Beverly donated to St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Augusta the land on which the church stands today from property she had inherited from her father.

She is survived by sons J. Michael Petty (Stephanie) of Fairfax, VA; Ronald V. Petty of Columbia; D. Timothy Petty of Charleston; John E. Petty (Gabriela) of Summerville; daughter Edna Petty Gantt (Russell) of Summerville; 14 grandchildren, and 9 great grandchildren. She was predeceased by her husband, Joseph M. (Joe) Petty, Sr.; her son Carl F. Petty of Cleveland, TN; her father Joseph Gray Sherling and her mother Agatha Elizabeth (Bessie) McDevitt Sherling. Visitation will be from 6:00 to 8:00 pm on Friday, September 15, at Parks Funeral Home, 130 W 1st North St, Summerville. Burial with graveside service on Saturday, September 16, at 1 o’clock in Westover Memorial Park, 2601 Wheeler Rd, Augusta, GA. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations in her memory to the Shriners Hospitals for Children.

Arrangements by PARKS FUNERAL HOME, 130 W. 1st North Street, Summerville, SC 29483. www.parksfuneralhome.com

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