FARMINGTON – Barbara Hinkley’s daughter, Ginny Dyment, brought her hand to her mouth as the SAD 9 bus her mother had driven before her retirement in October pulled into the funeral service parking lot.
Dyment carried two yellow roses as she walked, crying, to the bus that was carrying district bus drivers Saturday.
She sobbed as she ran her hand several times over the number 22 on the front of the Blue Bird school bus.
Hinkley, 59, of Jay, died instantly Thursday when her PT Cruiser and a full-size pickup truck collided on Routes 2 and 4 in Wilton.
“My mother loved her job,” Dyment said through her tears as she hugged SAD 9’s director of transportation, David Leavitt, who drove the bus to Western Mountains Cremation and Funeral Service.
Hinkley had driven a bus for SAD 9 for nearly 20 years. For many of the later years, it was the bus that carried Farmington Falls and Chesterville students to schools in Farmington.
Grief counselors were available at schools Friday to help students and staff cope with Hinkley’s death.
Hinkley was remembered for her love of children and her dedication to her job and family.
Hundreds of people from all over New England came to pay their respects to Hinkley and her family.
So many came that when the funeral service’s rooms were packed to capacity with 350 people, a representative of the company came outside and said he couldn’t squeeze any more people in, he said.
He brought outside a guest book for people to sign, and those in line either waited until after the service or went to the Farmington Elks Lodge No. 2430, where members of the Farmington Emblem Club No. 460 had organized a gathering for after the service.
Hinkley was a member of the Emblem Club, a social service organization, serving as the club’s president in 1987-88 and 2002-03, and as president of Maine Emblem Club for one term.
Hinkley was voted “Sister of the Year” in 1992-93 by her peers.
A past president of the local club, Debbie Holt of New Sharon, said the club’s first vice president, Quinnale Kinsey, had organized the gathering for family and friends at the lodge.
“Oh, Barbara,” Holt said. “Emblem was her life besides her children.”
Holt and Hinkley had traveled together many times to state conventions around Maine and other New England states, she said. Another Emblem Club member, Teresa Johnson, said she first met Hinkley when Hinkley and her husband, David, ran a service station and convenience store on Routes 2 and 4 in Farmington, at the present site of the Irving Big Stop. Hinkley had been her children’s bus driver at times.
“She was just a wonderful person,” Johnson said. “She was always there to help anybody in need. She had a big heart.”
“She would have loved this very much,” Holt said of the club’s members preparing the food for the gathering.
“You can’t believe she’s gone. We haven’t had a chance to see her. It happened so quick,” Holt said. “We have a meeting Thursday – that’s when it will hit us. That’s when we’ll miss her.”
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