Mary Louise Stevens

Mary Louise (Blair) Stevens passed away at home in Kosse, on Monday, February 15, 2016, at age 85. Visitation will be held on Wednesday, February 17, 2016, from 5:00 to 9:00 P.M. in the Groesbeck Funeral Home Chapel. Graveside services and Celebration of Mary’s life will be held at 2:00 P.M. on Thursday, February 18, 2016, at Fort Parker Memorial Park, with Pastor Kevan Wood of the First Baptist Church of Livingston officiating. Mary was born October 7, 1930 to Estill Blair and Anna Marie (May) Blair at home in rural Denver, Kentucky. She grew up in and around Paintsville, KY. As a young lady, Mary was working at Murphy’s 5 & 10 in downtown Paintsville, KY when Jesse Stevens became her customer every day at the food counter, drinking lots of coffee, and six weeks later became her husband. Mary and Jesse N. Stevens were married at the Funeral Home in Paintsville, Kentucky on December 16, 1950. They made their home in Kentucky the next ten years, and their only child, Teresa, was born there. They lived in California four years, before moving to Texas and making their permanent home in Channelview. Mary had enjoyed working at Hoffman Candy Co. while living in California. In Texas, she drove a catering truck for Regal Food Service for twenty-eight years, loving the job and the people she met. She left home daily at 3:00 a.m. to have the food truck at the Houston Ship Channel industrial district for 5:30 breakfast through the lunch hour, until back home at 2:30 p.m. In spite of the long days, she loved serving and talking with the customers, and once she was retired she could not go anywhere without running into someone she knew, and of course stopped to talk with each one. Later, she also did food demonstrations in Channelview stores, once again enjoying meeting and talking with people. Mary loved to dress nicely, with make-up and her hair coiffed. If all the people she had touched in her life were to gather at one time, a building could not hold them all. She especially loved her grandchildren. Mary and Jesse’s lives were devoted to church and their family. She taught Sunday school (including her grandchildren) and Sunbeams for many years at Bayshore Baptist Church, and later sang in the choir when they moved to Green’s Bayou Assembly of God Church. After losing her husband in 2012, Mary had lived with her daughter at Kosse for the past three and one-half years. Mary was preceded in death by her parents; three sisters, Melba J. (Blair) Blair, Anna Lee (Blair) Webb, and Wanda Jean Blair; one brother, Joe E. Blair; and her husband Jesse N. Stevens. She is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Teresa and Elwyn Denman of Kosse; grandson and his wife, Blake and Lani Denman of Bryan; granddaughter and her husband, Wendi and Brian Brightwell of Kosse; grandson, Ryan Denman of Kosse; seven great grandchildren: Kaitlyn and husband Preston Baize of Thornton; Victoria Denman of Kosse, Jaxson and Brazos Brightwell of Kosse, Sophie and Maxwell Denman of Waco, Brantley Denman of Bryan; one great-great grandson, Braxton Baize; and a brother, Leo Blair of Carey, Ohio and a sister, Sue Wentling of Carey, Ohio.