Mary Louise Trammell

Mary Trammell, 86, of Waco went to be with the Lord on October 10 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease. Mary was born on April 14, 1939 in Dothan, Alabama to her loving parents, Louise and Clarence Shiver. She met Lawrence, her devoted husband of 66 years, during their senior year at Dothan High School. They were married in Dothan and shortly thereafter moved to Port Arthur, Texas. In addition to Dothan, Waco and Port Arthur, Mary and Lawrence have had the opportunity to live in Houston, Wappingers Falls, New York, and both Hudson and Stow, Ohio. Mary made many friends at each of those stops in her journey.

She also witnessed to many high school age students through teaching Sunday School for many years. She was active in leading teenage girls in her local church’s Girls in Action chapter. When her boys were old enough to more or less behave unsupervised, she worked for several years as an interior decorator, a career she enjoyed immensely. Mary also took travel agent courses to help her organize trips for church groups.

A student of American History, Mary enjoyed the chance to explore the sites in New England where the United States was born. She encouraged her family to appreciate American history as well, including planning a family Bicentennial trip to locations like Lexington, Concord, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington DC. Her sons might be old enough now to admit the trip was cool. Mary was also an avid baseball fan, and particularly enjoyed cheering for the Cincinnati Big Red Machine in the 1970s.

Mary’s survivors include Lawrence, her sons Tim of Silsbee, Texas, Rob (wife Katie) of Delaware, Ohio, and Ken (wife Cindy) of Waco, and her former daughter-in-law Mija Trammell of Copley, Ohio. Her grandchildren Josh of Hudson, Ohio, Jenna of New Bedford, Massachusetts, Samantha Arseneau (husband Isaac) of Knoxville, Tennessee and Sarah Martin (husband Jonathan) of Waco will miss her very much. Mary also leaves behind many long-time friends who are family, especially some of those teenagers she and Lawrence taught in Sunday School, Jim and Vickie Thompson of Waco and Cindy (husband Rob) Sterling of McGregor. Mary was preceded in death by her mother, her father, her brother Bruce and her sister Anne Byrd, all of Dothan.

Mary’s family is indebted to the wonderful caregivers who worked with loving hearts and hands to make her final days as painless as possible. These include the wonderful team at Brookdale Lake Brazos who treated her like family, the nursing staff at Baylor Scott and White on the sixth floor who cared for her during her hospital stay, the caregivers from One You Love Homecare in Waco and the hospice team from Amedisys in Waco. Thank you with all our hearts for loving on her.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to First Baptist Church of Waco and Broadman Baptist Church of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio.