April 18, 2023 at 9:05 a.m.
Sofokidis, Jeanette H. "Jan"
Sofokidis, Jeanette H. "Jan"
Jan was born in Dodgeville, WI on Dec. 11, 1928, to Raymond and Gladys Narveson Gullick. After completing high school there, she attended the University of Wisconsin in Madison and received a B.A. in journalism in 1951.
That summer she worked with the Navy Dept. in Washington, DC, remaining there for the next three years to work with the Central Intelligence Agency. In her spare time she took graduate courses in journalism, foreign languages, and international geopolitics at local universities.
In 1954 she moved to Istanbul, Turkey to work on a Cold War project, remaining there for two years. She married Hristaki "Taki" Sofokidis in Istanbul on Jan. 8, 1957.
They lived in Tempe, AZ where both attended Arizona State University and obtained degrees in 1960 - Taki a B.S. in engineering, Jan an M.A. in education. Jan taught English at the Tempe high school for these three years.
Following a year of work in Southern California, they moved to the Washington, DC area. Jan worked a year at the National Education Association, then moved to the U.S. Office of Education where she worked in public affairs for a dozen years, including the busy, exciting Kennedy-Johnson years in the White House.
Their daughter, Rhea, was born in New Haven, CT in 1966 while Taki was studying at Yale University. In 1969 he accepted his first overseas tour of duty, two years in Kuwait, then back to Washington, and settled in Alexandria, VA.
In 1975 he accepted another overseas assignment, Iran, and Jan basically retired from government service and found school, office, or volunteer work to occupy her spare time while living overseas as a housewife and mother. Then followed another two years in Kuwait, then four years in Atlanta, GA, for Rhea to get another taste of Stateside high school education and a start in college (VA Tech). Taki and Jan spent the next two years in Saudi Arabia, then two more years in D.C. and started another tour in Kuwait. The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990 brought that assignment to a screeching halt. As a final assignment with the FHWA Taki served as assistant to the regional director in Fort Worth. He retired in April 1993.
Jan and Taki have made Arlington their home since 1991. Both have been active in church affairs and various volunteer activities. Jan has been a member of women's clubs, and was particularly active in duplicate bridge groups, her life-long hobby. Travel, both foreign and domestic, brought wonderful years of people and places into her long life. Her 20-plus years of research work on her family's genealogy gives only a glimpse into its fascinating history of the Norsemen and women who immigrated to southwestern Wisconsin then helped blaze the trails West.
Jan was preceded in death by her husband, Taki (passed on January 3, 2023, and interred in Arlington, TX at Moore Memorial Gardens); both parents (interred in Dodgeville, WI Cemetery); brother Glenwood "Glenn" (interred at the DFW National Cemetery in Dallas); and Dale Gullick and his wife Myra, of Phoenix.
SURVIVORS - Jan is survived by their daughter, Rhea Eleanor Haner, her husband Daniel and their twin children, Christopher and Stephanie, 23; a sister, Marilyn Jean Larsen of Largo, FL; and a number of nieces, nephews, and cousins and their families. [Hendrickson, Narveson, Stephens, Gullick, Dyreson, Alvstad, Hamre families, many still in Dodgeville, WI.] A Memorial service will be held April 24, 2023 at 10:30am; at New World United Methodist 2201 N Davis Dr, Arlington, TX 76012
