DIXFIELD – Mary C. Vargas, R.N., 69, died Wednesday, July 23, at the Central Maine Medical Center. She was a resident of Brackett Street in Dixfield.

She was born May 20, 1939, in Jersey City, N.J., a daughter of the late Thomas and Mary (Murphy) Collins. She graduated from Demarest High School, Class of 1957, in Hoboken, N.J., and received her registered nursing degree in 1959 from St. Mary’s School of Nursing in Hoboken, N.J. She worked as a registered nurse for many years in different hospitals in New Jersey, New York, and Maine, and also at the Rumford Community Home in Rumford until her retirement in 2005.

She was a communicant of parish of the Holy Savior, St. Athanasius-St. John Church. She loved to play the piano, work in her garden, spend time with her family and grandchildren and having coffee with her family and friends.

Survivors include a daughter, Lisa Picard and her husband, Dana, of Dixfield; three sons, Hugo Vargas and his wife, Teresa, of Thousand Oaks, Calif., Lorenzo Vargas and companion, Bertha Veilleux, of Rumford and John Vargas and companion, Carmen Thibodeau, of Peru; two brothers, John Collins and his wife, Rosemarie, of Pennelville, N.Y., and Thomas Collins and his wife, Kathleen, of Hebron; 10 grandchildren, Miranda, Martina, Cordelia and Amelia Vargas, all of Thousand Oaks, Calif., Mallory Tompkins of Dixfield, Corinne Tompkins of Portland, Isabelle Picard of Dixfield, Grace and Vincent Hebert of Dixfield and Abigail Thibodeau of Dixfield: and a great-grandson, Avery Young of Dixfield.