Catherine Coggin Branson

She was born in Pensacola, Florida, to Carol and Robert Coggin, and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. On December 22, 1979, she married William "Bill" Branson in Greensboro. Two years later to the day, on their second anniversary, their son Will was born. Their son Robby came along a few years after.

For more than 25 years she worked at Boston Elementary School in Woodstock — the same school her own sons attended.

Cathy loved to make things. She quilted, sewed, and embroidered, and she kept a room in the house for it. Most of what came out of that room was for somebody else.

She was, above all, a grandmother. To Abigail, Violet, and Theo, she was Grammy. She was there for Abby every step of the way, and she showed up for Violet and Theo the moment she was needed. She once drew a flower for Abby, freehand, because Abby asked her to. It is on Abby's arm now, in her grandmother's own lines.

She was the one everyone leaned on. When someone needed her, she showed up — immediately, no questions asked, every time. Her children, her grandchildren, her friends, her mother. She never made any of it look like a favor.

Cathy loved the water. She loved cruises — especially with Wilma Tully and Retta Shaw — and the beach, and a chair in the sun with her family nearby. She snorkeled and took pictures of the fish. She spent her life looking for the bluest water she could find. Next week her family will carry her back to Pensacola, on a trip she had already planned to take with them.

She was preceded in death by her father, Robert Coggin.

She is survived by her husband of forty-seven years, Bill; her sons Robby (Megan) and Will (Alison); her grandchildren Abigail, Violet, and Theo; her mother, Carol Coggin; her sister, Karen (Phil) Joyce; her brother, Bobby (Beth) Coggin; her aunt, Debra Little; and her best friend of thirty-seven years, Wilma Tully, who was a sister to her in every way that counted.

Memorial donations can be made to the American Heart Association.