Mary Frances Sparkman McAlister, beloved wife, sister and aunt, went home to be with her Lord and Savior on June 15, 2026, after a brief illness.  She was born on March 30, 1940 to Harvey Monroe Sparkman and Katherine Anderson Sparkman in Ponca City, Oklahoma, but made her home in Tulsa for many years.

The sixth of seven “Sparkman Girls,” she graduated from Daniel Webster High School in Tulsa in 1958 and was inducted into the Daniel Webster Hall of Fame in 1994.  Together with her sisters, Janet, Martha and Sally, she sang in the sisters’ southern gospel quartet for many years, as well as the church choir at Carbondale Assembly of God church. 

In 1993 at a high school reunion, Mary reunited with Dan McAlister, a high school friend.  They later married and settled on Grand Lake.  Following the move to Grand Lake, Mary managed the bookkeeping for Dan’s business, D-Mac Electric. 

Active in her community, both in Tulsa and in her later years at Grand Lake, she served in Tulsa as President of the American Business Women’s Association, volunteered for the childrens’ program at Cleora Christian Church and loved to house and dog sit for Murphy, the yellow lab belonging to her dear friends Nancy and Len Dalquest. In 2015 Mary joined PAAS, the local animal shelter in Vinita, as executive assistant until she retired in 2020.

She and Dan loved to travel, making yearly trips to the Oregon Coast and Mexico.  Mary was the fourth member of “The Sand Pebbles” foursome with friends Jeanne Woods, Mary Claiborne and Nancy Dalquest, and traveled with them on adventures to San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Laughlin and Las Vegas. 

Mary is survived by her husband, Dan McAlister, her sister Linda Evans, her step-daughters Danise Conrad and Kris Cypert, and a number of nieces and nephews who will always remember weekends at Grand Lake, Saturdays spent boating and waterskiing, and summer evenings of large outdoor family dinners under the evening sky.  She was preceded in death by her parents and her sisters, Loretta Moore, Marie Arland, Janet Lay, Martha Gardner and Sally Brooks, and her step children, Trina Williams, Brian Williams and Danette Turner.

Services and Internment will be held on Friday, June 19 at 10:00 a.m. at Green Hill Cemetery, Sapulpa, Oklahoma.