Lucile Holt Williamson

Special from the beginning, Jesse Lucile Holt Williamson was born in Bessemer, Alabama on April 5, 1923 as the only child and cherished daughter of native Alabamians Lucile Long Scruggs and Julien Rembert Holt. With her two sons at her side, Lucile passed away in Yakima, Washington on October 5, 2014. A beautiful, intelligent woman raised with southern charm, graciousness, and charity at her core, Lucile graduated from Montevallo Women’s College during World War II with a degree in Sociology.

After a brief career for the Anniston Alabama Red Cross, a handsome navy Seabee newly returned from overseas captured her heart and on October 9, 1946 Ullman Franklin Williamson became her lifelong husband and soul mate. Like so many young couples following the War, they packed up their meager belongings, including one year old son little Turner Franklin born in 1949, and moved west to make their mark in life. Settling into a booming west Texas town called Abilene, Frank went to work in the oil patch with his brother Harry while Lucile settled in as a young housewife.

With the birth of Julien Holt in 1950, Lucile was now raising two boys and embracing her new life creating a home in Texas. Those who ever found themselves near or around Lucile had to be prepared to be spoken to. Always very social, Lucile thoroughly enjoyed getting to know people, luring them in with a bright, enthusiastic personality, no matter where she happened to be. She was active in her boys’ school, Abilene Women’s Club, PEO, community affairs, and the First Presbyterian Church where she met many of her lifelong friends.

Booms come and booms go but booms of any kind are all risky affairs. In the mid-sixties the oil business packed its bags and moved to North Africa and the Middle East. Lucile and Frank decided a chance for a better, if not easier, future remained in Abilene. Oil went, they stayed. But staying in Abilene required Frank to find more stable work with the U.S. Postal Service and it also required Lucile to return to school and enter the job market. Despite the work and time it took, Lucile never neglected her family. Becoming a public school teacher at Lincoln Junior High School added more responsibility to the young homemaker; Frank, Turner, and Holt quickly learned their wife and mother was Wonder Woman. It was a new world, often fun but never easy. Each Williamson had to pick up new responsibilities and improve their game.

The boys grew up, left home and went to college allowing them to avoid the draft and combat in Viet Nam. That’s the way their father Frank wanted it having seen and suffered more than enough in the Pacific. Frank was not a pacifist, just a realist. While the boys were still in college, Frank died in Abilene in 1971 from a massive heart attack. Lucile was alone. She remained unmarried until her death. Lucile retired from teaching in 1985 after twenty five years. She traveled with her friends and frequently to visit her boys and their families. Lucile remained their greatest fan and supporter yielding without restraint her time, company, home, when needed, and love. Moms by their nature are the most precious resource we have. Above and beyond that fact is another – Lucile, our mom, was the very best. Lucile is survived by sons Turner and Holt Williamson, daughter in law Sara Williamson, grandchildren Rita Lucile Murphy and Walker Ross Williamson, two great-grandchildren Bridget Lucile Murphy and Sullivan Ross Murphy, cousin, Val Price, Jr, and niece, Ann Williamson Serafino.

No immediate services are planned. In honor of Lucile’s love of animals and social justice, memorials in her memory can be made to those she long supported – your local animal shelter or the Southern Poverty Law Center.