June was born in Detroit, Michigan to Isaac and Georgia "Collins" Larkin. She graduated from Bell High School in California. She met the love of her life, a youthful and proper Quaker man, at the Bell Friends Church. She married Robert Bates in the Huntington Park friends Church in Huntington Park, California on August 10, 1939. She was a devoted wife and mother. As the family grew, she found herself as a minister's wife from time to time. They lived in several locations from Utah to Indiana and Michigan. They had a total of five children. After the fifth was born in 1953, they moved back to California. They lived for a time in Maywood and then moved to Norwalk. They lived there until 1968 when they moved to Barstow, California. She received her Bachelor's and Master's Degree from Chapman College after their children were grown. During their 32 year stay in Barstow, June was active with the Trinity Baptist Church and she taught for the Barstow Unified School District for over 20 years. In 2000 they relocated to Kennewick, Washington. June was preceded in death by her husband and brothers, Jack Larkin and Howard "Budd" Larkin. June is survived by her sisters, Barbara Jean Gibson of Michigan and Betty Highham of California; her children, David Bates of Fullerton, California, Becky Rowland of Vancouver, Washington, Ruth Bates of Kennewick, Washington, Jon Bates of Marysville, Washington and Stephen Bates of Boring, Oregon. She proudly claimed ten grandchildren, twenty-two great grandchildren and two great-great grandchildren.