Juanita Harris Kendrick passed away on January 5th at her home of 54 years. Nita, was born on August 23, 1930 in Jenkinsburg, Georgia, the fourth and last surviving child of Chester Bryan Harris and Elizabeth Fletcher Harris.
A child of the depression, Nita often recalled the year her family lived on $5.00 and what their small farm, chickens and hogs could provide. She attended Jackson High School where she was a star on the women’s basketball team. Nita left home to attend North Georgia College and was the first in her family to obtain an undergraduate degree.
At North Georgia she met the love of her life, Nisbet (“Neb”) Kendrick. They moved first to Clemson, South Carolina where Neb was stationed to teach physics but were soon transferred to military housing in Albuquerque, New Mexico where Neb was deployed to the Sandia Mountain “special weapons project.” Nita recounted stories of dust storms, MP’s arriving in the middle of the night to escort her husband for secret assignments of unknown duration and driving solo across the country with two infants to return to her beloved Jenkinsburg home place for Christmas.
In 1956 Nita and Neb moved to Atlanta. She briefly taught at Northwoods Elementary and then began a career as a private kindergarten teacher and later as the director of a large pre-school program at Dunwoody Methodist Church.
Nita served for many years as a volunteer at Scottish Rite Children’s Hospital which provided her with free medical care during her childhood. She and Neb sustained the historic Sharron Methodist Church near their home for many years until moving their membership to North Springs Methodist for as long as she was able to attend.
Nita loved travel, whether camping or cruising the world with Neb, walking the beach at their Beachdewller home on Jekyll Island and, more than anything, gathering and spending time with close and extended family. She was an accomplished seamstress and never tired of making and “doing”. When he was very young, her grandson Harris bestowed her the very apt moniker “Domama” by which she was known to her family from then on.
Nita is survived by her son, Nisbet (“Kenny”) Kendrick and his wife Bambi, their children Harris Kendrick and Meredith Kendrick Clayton, great grandson Emmet Clayton, her daughter, Debbie Kendrick Adkins’ children Elizabeth Thompson and Bryan Adkins, and nephews Richard Harris and Phil Ross.
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