Wilma Mount Goad

Wilma Mount Goad died peacefully at home on the morning of June 20, 2026. She was 94. Wilma was born on May 24, 1932 in a small white house in Mountain View, California, and grew up in the Bordeaux neighborhood of Nashville.

She met the love of her life, Ray Goad, when she was a young woman, but he looked on her as more of a little sister until one day he randomly walked into the ice cream parlor where she worked and it was basically love at second sight. They married on July 7, 1951, when she was 19, at the Seventeenth Street Christian Church in Nashville. They had three children and spent 69 years together, until Ray’s death in May 2020.

Wilma raised her family in Memphis, where Ray got a job as an engineer after graduating from Vanderbilt University. Occasionally Wilma would take on part-time jobs to make extra money for her kids, but mostly she was a stay-at-home mother who was known in the neighborhood for her great homemade chocolate chip cookies and homemade pizza.

In 1963, Wilma and Ray traveled to Panama to visit her older brother, who was in the military and stationed there. But most summers the family vacations consisted of tent camping and hiking in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and visiting Gatlinburg and local potteries in Pigeon Forge. Wilma was a beautiful woman who in her younger years resembled the actress Ava Gardner, but she enjoyed the outdoors and rarely complained about sleeping on the hard ground, cooking on a camp stove, or sitting around a campfire while her husband told ghost stories. Whether it was an occasional run-in with a bear or climbing a mountain when she was afraid of heights, she was game for anything.

In 1966, the family took a road trip out west to visit Wilma’s relatives in California. She explored many national parks with her children along the way, and gasped when they got too close to a mountain cliff or the edge of the Grand Canyon. Side trips to Disneyland and Knott’s Berry Farm were highlights as well.

After retirement, Ray and Wilma continued to stay active. For years they walked three miles every day. They also continued to travel, taking trips to places like Spain, London, Germany and Russia. Avid birders, they took a trip with close friends in 1999 to the South Pacific to add birds from Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Tahiti to their life lists.

Wilma loved to collect things, including owls and clocks. She searched relentlessly for arrowheads in plowed fields and for prized seashells, especially on the beaches of Sanibel, Fla.

When Ray and Wilma celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2001, Wilma did not want her children to throw them a big party. Instead, she planned a romantic trip to Paris for just the two of them. While they were there, they had their portrait sketched by a street artist, and it still hangs in their bedroom.

Ray once told his youngest daughter that he could never repay Wilma for the wonderful life she had given him. They were affectionate with each other until the day he died.

Wilma had many nicknames. Her older brother Lenwood called her Baby. Her two sisters called her Mimi. In later life, she became known as Reboo, a name bestowed upon her by her oldest grandchild, who as a toddler constantly asked her to “read book” but could only say reboo. The name stuck, and she was known to everyone as Reboo for the rest of her life.

She is survived by her three children: Lisa Goad Hughes (Mark) of Bainbridge, Ga.; Mark Goad (Rhonda) of Hiram, Ga.; and Meredith Goad of Smyrna, Tn.; five grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren. She also had several “adopted” grandchilden.

The family would like to thank the staff of Adoration Hospice and Home Helpers Home Care for their loving and respectful help, care and guidance during the final weeks of Wilma’s life.

Visitation will be from 1:30 to 3 p.m. Saturday June 27 at Woodlawn-Roesch-Patton Funeral Home, 660 Thompson Lane, Nashville. Burial will follow.

In lieu of flowers, send a donation in her name to your favorite charity or one that you think she would like. She loved children and birds, so St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital or Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital, or the National Audubon Society, would make her happy in heaven.