Gary
Robert Barnes was born in Oak Park, Illinois on March 18,
1944. He passed away at his home in Cocoa Beach, Florida on
September 2, 2021. He grew up primarily in Kankakee, Illinois
and attended the University of Illinois in Champaign where he
received a Bachelor’s Degree in Accountancy, and later a
Masters of Business Administration.
At Illinois he spent four years as a student manager of the
football team, and often reminisced about his time there
during the school’s best season in recent memory when it won
the 1963 Rose Bowl.
Gary worked at General Motors his entire career, where he
met Valerie Skwarczynski. Valerie and Gary were married on
August 7, 1976 and soon after had three children, Jamie,
Justin, and Michael. They relocated to Springboro, Ohio in
1981.
As his children grew up in Springboro, Gary was an avid
watcher of all of their soccer, baseball, and softball games
and their swim meets. He spent many of his evenings and
weekends taking them to and from try-outs, practices, games,
and tournaments, and his vacations taking the family on
trips to Cocoa Beach, Florida and throughout the Western
U.S., where they enjoyed visiting numerous national parks.
In 1994 the family moved to France for two years, and then
returned to Pinckney, Michigan, where Gary spent the later
stages of his career travelling around the world to
countries including Brazil, Venezuela, Ecuador, China, the
Philippines, Thailand, the Czech Republic, and Russia, often
accompanied by his wife Valerie, who herself was an avid
traveler.
Gary’s wife Valerie passed away in 2007 and he missed her
greatly. In his later years he spent his time living
seasonally in Pinckney, Michigan and Cocoa Beach Florida,
where he enjoyed reading history and classic literature,
eating a well-grilled fish, watching all of the Detroit
sports teams, and the Illinois, Michigan, and Oklahoma
college football teams. While the games themselves were
often disappointing, Gary still had fun watching them and he
always looked forward to each new season.
Throughout his life he was happiest attending events with
his growing and grown-up children, the big events like
graduations and weddings, as well as the smaller ones like
Dad’s day college football games, and holiday get-togethers.
He was very excited about the birth of his first grandchild,
expected in October, whom he unfortunately never got to
meet.
Gary is survived by his children Jamie Visel of Whitmore
Lake, Michigan, Justin Barnes of Big Stone Gap, Virginia,
and Michael Barnes of Champaign, Illinois, and by his
younger brother Tom Barnes of North Aurora, Illinois.
Gary’s Community Farewell will be held on Tuesday, September
14, 2021, at 1:00 PM (10AM-1PM gathering) at Borek Jennings
Funeral Home, Hamburg Chapel, Michigan.
