Viola White Harper

Anna Viola White Harper, known most of her 95 plus years as Viola W. Harper, was born in Mobile County to Rev. William Edward White Sr and Flora Brooks Crook White on August 19, 1925. After a vigorous, illustrious life and her last valiant battles with severe illnesses, Mrs. Harper was transfigured to her next life on June 24, 2021. She peacefully passed over the portal with loving family members around her bed. Among numerous deceased loved ones are her parents named above, her husband

Willard Ray (W. R. or “Hop”) Harper, her daughter Willow Faye Harper Zanaty (Eddie), and her full brothers and baby sister, Bill, Alton, Earl, and Norma White.

Surviving Mrs. Harper are her daughter, Elizabeth Ann Harper Padgett (Don); her brother, Robert Alexander White Sr (Irene); her six grandchildren, Deborah L. Padgett (Karl Stapelfeldt), Edward Samuel Zanaty Jr (Kelly), Stephen David Padgett Sr (Kim), Julia Ann Zanaty Foster (Harry), Jonathan Russell Padgett (Carolyn Hembree), and Timothy Harper Zanaty Sr (Amie). Her thirteen greatgrandchildren

are: Stephen David Padgett Jr (Amber), Anna M. Stapelfeldt, Edward Samuel Zanaty III, Bradley Lanier Padgett, Amy Brooke Zanaty, Hayden Austin Foster, Hunter Ashton Foster, James Tyler Padgett, Kathryn Elizabeth Foster, Elizabeth Abrasley Zanaty, Timothy Harper Zanaty Jr, Mamie Anne Hembree-

Padgett, and Lila Kathryn Willow Zanaty. Also surviving their Aunt, great Aunt, half- Aunt, or cousin are numerous other also beloved ones.

Viola White Harper was a child of the Great Depression of the 1930s during her most formative years living in the Cedar Creek community outside of Citronelle in southern Alabama. Yet the harsh, even deprived, living circumstances of that decade and her family did not quench her early thirst for knowledge and a better life for herself and her loved ones. Her pastor father was also an excellent educator, and she quickly gained her lifelong appreciation and love for faith, family, academic excellence and a strong work ethic. Due to her elder father’s faltering health by the 1930s, her family often needed her mother and older brother to get outside jobs. As the second oldest child in their growing family (her daddy’s second family), Viola became a main family caregiver, especially for her ailing father and her younger brothers early on. Indeed, her youngest brother Bob was placed in her ten-year-old arms to tend soon after his birth.

With her parents’ blessing, Viola was married at sixteen in a Church of the Brethren church ceremony presided over by her father in 1941, months before the United States was pulled into World War II by the bombing of Pearl Harbor. When war was thrust upon our nation, her husband was “frozen” in his job with GM&O Railroad by the US government, as were all employees for the vital rail system, for the duration of the war. Both of their children were born during the war years of the 1940s. There was little celebrating the war’s end in her family at first, however, because Viola’s dear father, her daddy, passed away the same day.

Her new nuclear family of four soon moved away from south Alabama after war’s end. Her husband was transferred to a new railroad post in central Mississippi as a Section Foreman. There, the four of them began the next stage of their lives together. One by one, all three of her younger brothers had short to lengthy stays with them, with young Bob living with them the longest. Bob White soon became the much loved big brother to his young nieces and a de facto son to his sister and brother-in-law.

In her long life, Viola W. Harper was a resident of Mississippi or South Alabama for most of her 95 years. Her early years of marriage and parenthood were sometimes lived in poverty in houses without indoor plumbing or electricity. Even then, the couple always did their best to ensure each house became a happy, safe home for their family. And, with her loving husband’s hard but poorly paid work on the railroad, his firm support and encouragement, and her own intellect, incredible grit, many talents, and

hard work, Viola gained three degrees (from East Mississippi Junior College where she was valedictorian, Mississippi State University, and Louisiana State University).

Viola was an excellent educator, using her positions in churches and schools to teach and encourage youngsters and adults of all ages most of her life. She was smart, learned quickly, and had such a strong-willed, confident, and witty personality even as a youngster, that the school administration at times used her as a fill-in substitute teacher while she was still in high school. She worked as an educator and librarian for much of her life. She taught at Linville High School, Meridian High School, and later was school librarian at Satsuma High school in the 1950s and early ‘60s. Also in the early1960s, she became Children’s Librarian in downtown’s Mobile Public Library. Soon, she had a weekly segment on a local TV program where she read a child’s story book for children. She had earlier established popular, regularly scheduled special reading and talking sessions with young children at the main public library itself.

In the second half of the sixties, Viola was hired by the first president of the new University of South Alabama as the school’s first Reference Librarian while the nascent library was still in the basement of the school’s first building until the new library was designed and built. She oversaw the move to USA’s beautiful library and established the library’s reference department as head reference librarian, a role she retained until her retirement. In a lovely 2012 ceremony and reception held in that same library, the

current reference department was named for her by the University.There were many other well earned accolades for some of her even more numerous accomplishments during her career. Of her longest-lasting career accomplishments, she was proudest of her own small role in the legal struggle to establish equal pay for equal work for women at the University of South Alabama, and of her own behind the

scenes contribution to USA’s work to obtain rights to a share of the Oil and Gas leases in the Gulf of Mexico. Working in the library very late one night, she discovered a key document they needed to prove their case. USA won, and this fine university of today is there for all to see. There were other upfront accolades for career accomplishments that she enjoyed and cherished as well. A fun one was being named Alumnus of the Year at EMJC, complete with being driven in the homecoming parade, ceremonies and such at Scooba, Mississippi. After her retirement, she continued to support USA and

its Foundation in every way she could. She was always made welcome there.

Almost needless to say, Viola as wife, mother, sister and relative also encouraged and did all she could to aid her own family members to become their best selves through education as well. In addition to her siblings or other relations, she aided her multitalented husband to gain his own degree from EMJC, a proud day for his family too.

Viola White Harper spent years of Christian fellowship and service in the following churches of her lifetime: Cedar Creek Church of the Brethren, Scooba Baptist Church, Popular Springs Drive Baptist Church, Cottage Hill Baptist Church, and Cypress Shores Baptist Church. She was also honored to be asked to preach a sermon at Cedar Creek Church of the Brethren one year, a high point for this minister’s kid.

Pallbearers for Mrs. Harper’s final services will be Ed Zanaty, David Padgett, Jonathan Padgett, Tim Zanaty, Stephen Padgett and Samuel Zanaty. Hayden Foster will ring her final bell signal. Rev. Robby White of Locus Grove Baptist Church in New Market, Alabama will preside over these farewell services.

Funeral Services for Viola Harper are on Thursday, July 1. Starting with Visitation for the family at 10 AM , Visitation for friends as well as family begins at 11 AM. The latter will be closed casket but both will include audio-visual aids featuring her life and family. Her Funeral service led by Robby White will begin at noon, with her burial service beginning immediately thereafter in the church cemetery. Food

and drink for remaining family and friends will be provided in the fellowship hall after the final bell ringing of her final service on Earth.

Family and friends attending these final events for Vi Harper are asked to please wear a mask while indoors to help protect our most vulnerable from inadvertent exposure to the various mutating, pandemic viruses still at large in our land.

Viola was also an artist. Though she never had a lesson, she could play a piano or organ by ear from an early age. She had one art class and produced a masterpiece in her family’s opinion. She loved books and read voraciously when she could. She wrote poetry too, and would read it to others, but not allow copies. From her poems and her life, it is clear she loved flowers and babies. Most of all, Viola was a true gardener who always wanted to grow healthy plants and children. Those who feel moved to honor her

memory in a tangible way are welcome to do so with flowers, or by a donation in her name to USA’s Library or another educational institution of their choice.

Viola W. Harper will be laid to rest between her children’s daddy and her daddy. It is fitting. While her soul now exults in heaven, may her earthly body rest in peace in her beloved ground of Cedar Creek.