Verna Mae Moss

Verna “Mae” Moss, of Kosse, passed away Wednesday, May 22, 2013, at Providence Healthcare in Waco, following a brief illness, at age 87. Visitation will be held from 6:00 to 8:00 P.M. on Friday, May 24, 2013, at the Groesbeck Funeral Home. Graveside services will be held at 2:00 P.M. on Saturday May 25, 2013, at Ebenezer Cemetery, with Reverend Jack Wren of the First Baptist Church of Kosse officiating. Mae was born September 10, 1925 to William Washington Smethers and Mary Jane Woodruff Smethers at Lamesa. Her father was a Pentecostal minister who planted churches all over Texas, so the family moved many times while she was growing up. During World War II, Mae met Arthur Griner, who was a soldier home on leave. They married in 1942 in Edinburg, and they had one child. Later, in 1953, Mae who was a single mom at that time, moved to Weatherford, where she worked as a waitress at Mae’s Smokehouse Café on the Ranger highway. Mae met Billy Lee Moss, who was from Kosse, working in Weatherford for the telephone company, and they were married in 1962. In the early seventies, they settled on his family’s farm at Kosse, where he raised cattle. They briefly had a feed store in Kosse. After Billy passed away in 1997, Mae joined a singles club at Mexia, and served as President of the group for several years. They met for weekly game nights and eating out, but especially for dancing. Mae had always loved to dance, but became very active with the group, going dancing four nights a week up until the last six months. She loved to Two-Step, Jitter-bug, Twist, Polka and Waltz, all over central Texas. She was always dressed up, wearing diamonds and never costume jewelry, and she and her dancing partner enjoyed wearing matching shirts. When she wasn’t dancing, she was on one of her cell phones talking about dancing, or loving her two Chihuahuas. She only slowed down and finally had to quit going when her eye-sight prevented her driving in the last couple of months. Mae was preceded in death by her parents; her twin sister, Faye Cline; her two brothers, Dewey L. Smethers and Robbie L. Smethers; her husband, Billy Lee Moss; and her dancing partner, R. L. Brown. She is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Bonnie and Ronnie Pettigrew of Kosse; two grandsons, Jeff Pettigrew and wife Melanie of Rockdale, and Ronnie Pettigrew and wife Robbie of Kosse; six great grandchildren: Chelsea Watson and husband Clayton of Nucor, Kaitlyn Pettigrew of Kosse, Corbyn Pettigrew of Brenham, Shane, Luke, and Maylee of Rockdale; two great great grandsons, Lane Watson and Braxton Watson of Nucor; and two nieces, Katrina Suttle of Kosse and Brenda Ellzey of Houston.