Olive Jean Lawrence

Olive Jean Lawrence, 92, of Woodstock, Georgia, passed away on June 28, 2019 in Woodstock, Georgia. She was born to parents Whitcomb Riley Tippens and Nancy Elizabeth Wier, on March 7, 1927 in Hammon, a small town in western Oklahoma. Until young adulthood, she was called Olive Jean or oftentimes OJ, but in adulthood she began using Jean with new people she met. At a very young age, her parents moved the family via a horse-drawn wagon to Friona, a town in the Texas panhandle more than 200 miles from Hammon. It was the Dust Bowl Days, and they spent challenging years eking out a living as farmers. The family returned to western Oklahoma in 1938 and settled on her grandparents’ farm southeast of Hammon where Olive and her four siblings spent the remainder of their growing-up years. In later years, she would talk about the problems with “dust pneumonia” in West Texas and how people died from it. Even though western Oklahoma was dusty, she said the Friona area was worse.

Olive Jean sometimes told stories of life on the farm, such how her father tasked her as a young teenager to haul a load of harvested grain to the storage silos in Hammon while he and her older brother continued working in the field. The brakes on the truck were nearly nonexistent, so she controlled the speed by manually downshifting the transmission as she traversed the rolling hills of western Oklahoma. Another memory is how in the summer time when school was not in session, her paternal grandfather, Stonewall Jackson Tippens, would roust all the children out of bed for an early breakfast and then situate them into farming tasks, before he himself would head back to bed.

Olive Jean was educated in the public schools and graduated from Hammon High School in 1944. Higher education was a paramount goal to Olive Jean’s parents, and all five of their children graduated with college degrees. World War II was still raging when she matriculated in the fall of ’44 at Southwestern Institute of Technology (now Southwestern Oklahoma State University) in Weatherford, Okla., and with so many young men were off at war the gender ratio was dramatically lopsided the first year. She chose office and secretarial skills in the business department as her major, believing the training would provide two routes to jobs (working in administrative support in business or teaching those subjects in high school). She minored in health sciences, especially nutrition, which informed her meal plans later on as stay-at-home mom once married and raising children. Her college years were happy years; she was popular on campus and had many friends. Besides taking classes, she worked part-time for the head of the education department and received valuable on-the-job training in office skills, such as speed typing and dictation. OJ was active in a sorority as well as various clubs. A charming occurrence was being selected by Perry Como as one of the Top Ten Beauties at the college.

Upon college graduation, Olive Jean and her best friend Joyce moved to Los Angeles, a fun adventure a number of their Oklahoma high school and college friends had undertaken. She landed office jobs easily as a college grad, but became increasingly homesick for the red hills of her upbringing—plus the smog was so thick it hurt her eyes all the time. So OJ returned to Oklahoma after a year in California, choosing Oklahoma City with its many businesses and was hired as office chief for a small staff in a film company that rented educational films to schools. During that time, she was introduced to her future husband Franklin Leslie (“Les”) Lawrence of

Tulsa, Oklahoma. After a year of dating, Jean and Les were married at her aunt's home in Oklahoma City on September 1, 1951 and began their married life in Tulsa and were subsequently blessed with four children. It was a busy time as Les’s job in the oil industry required extensive traveling, which left Jean to “tend the home front.” Family was very important to Jean and Les and in spite of a hectic schedule with work and raising children, there were many opportunities to spend quality time with their extended families. At Jean’s behest, they became active at Yale Avenue Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), and all their children received their fundamental religious instruction during those years.

In 1965, the family moved to Houston, Texas when Les’s employer (Exxon) relocated their company headquarters from Tulsa. Jean and Les were charter members of Memorial Drive Christian Church (MDCC) and were faithful congregants for many decades. Besides their love of family, Jean and Les loved MDCC and their closest friends were fellow church members.

Two of Jean’s favorite pastimes were singing and playing the game of Bridge. She believed she received her love of singing from her grandfather Stonewall Tippens, a song leader in the Church of Christ congregation of her upbringing. At various times she concurrently participated in three choirs: the church choir, the Singing Bells and The Gospel Singers. She delighted participating in numerous Bridge groups over the years and hosted many gatherings at her home. But her favorite pastime focused on her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. Although none of them resided in Houston, she made many trips to visit them and enjoyed the times when her family would travel to Houston to visit her.

Jean is preceded in death by her husband, her parents, her brothers Riley Wier and Thomas Jackson (“Jack”) and her sisters Wanda “Janan” Gaston and Roberta “Joan” Shelton.

She is survived by her children and their spouses, Cheryl Ann (Rick) Page, Derrill Clayton (Lydia) Lawrence, James Franklin (Joanne) Lawrence and Lisa Kay (Doyle) Rabren, and by eight grandchildren, Elizabeth (Matt) Fehrman, Carl (partner Dave Rossel) Lawrence, Eric (Laura) Lawrence, Bret (Rachel) Page, Hilary (Jens Forsgård) Page, Lance Rabren, Tyler Rabren, and Maggie Rabren, and Paul Reagan, and two step grandchildren, Rachel Post and Stuart Jaffe. Jean is also survived by numerous great grandchildren.

The family has entrusted Forest Park Westheimer Cemetery, 12800 Westheimer Rd, Houston, TX 77077 with the arrangements. A Memorial Service is scheduled for 11:30 am on July 13, 2019 at Memorial Drive Christian Church, 11750 Memorial Drive, Houston, TX 77024. A reception will follow at the church. Her son, Reverend James Lawrence will co-officiate the service with Rev. Matthew Hudman. At 3pm, there will be a graveside service for the family. In lieu of flowers, donations in memory of Olive Jean may be made to Memorial Drive Christian Church, 11750 Memorial Drive, Houston, TX 77024.