Wilma was the daughter of Alfred Hiram McKim and Cora Ellen (Fullerton). She married a Jewish man named Samuel Mirkin on May 21 1932 in Sioux City, Woodbury Co., IA. Sam immigrated to the USA with his mother and siblings during the Russian Revolution. No children were born to this union. Sam and Wilma more than made up for this fact by caring for Wilma's nieces and nephews as if they were their own children.

When her sister Ruth fell ill, Wilma stayed with her to nurse her until her passing. Sam and Wilma paid her doctor bill, as well as paid for her cemetery plot. They were greatly involved in the lives of Ruth's three daughters after their mother passed away and they made sure that the girls never went without. In later years, Sam and Wilma helped to raise Ruth's grandson Pat.

In Wilma's early years she waited tables in Sioux City. After her marriage to Sam, the couple owned and operated a tavern in Sioux City during prohibition. The couple then moved to Minnesota and took up farming. In their golden years they moved out to California and involved themselves in the landlord business for apartment complexes. They witnessed the Watts riots in Los Angels firsthand and Wilma wrote of her frightening experience to her mother in a letter several days afterwards.

Wilma was full of unexpected surprises. You couldn't visit her home without her sending you home with your arms full of little gifts and goodies. You had to be careful about expressing that you liked something of Wilma's because she'd insist that you took it home with you! Wilma also religiously decorated the graves of her family members and friends every Memorial Day. I remember Wilma teaching me to roller-skate inside her home when I was about four or five. She told me that if I was going to learn to skate, I had to make rule with myself that I couldn't cry when I fell down. I never did cry when I fell! After Sam passed away, Wilma went to live in a nursing home with her older sister Velma. I remember visiting her and she'd always have her hair and makeup done up when we'd visit. She absolutely loved it when visitors would bring her gifts of food! She requested my mother to bring her onions on one of her visits and then sat there and peeled an onion like and orange and ate it straight out!

Wilma was a hard worker and a doting wife all her life. Taking care of Sam was always her main priority and she kept a kosher home for him.

A debt of gratitude is owed to both Sam and Wilma for their generosity and kindness towards Wilma's entire family throughout the years. The couple is buried together, which would have tickled Wilma's funnybone to think that she, a Southern Baptist girl, would be buried for all eternity in a Jewish cemetery!