Eva Langham

Eva Langham, 96, passed away quietly Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2018. She was born in Bates, Arkansas, one of five children of Blackburn H. and Mattie Pearl (Oxford) Bird. Her father worked for Hunt Oil Company, but when the East Texas Oil Field was discovered in the 1930s, he moved the family to Northeast Texas.

While visiting her sister Glenn, Eva met another Hunt Oil employee, Joe Dell Langham. They were married Sept. 7, 1941, in Quitman, Texas. They were apart briefly in World War II while Joe served in the U.S. Army in North Africa and Italy. They had two sons: Wayne Alan, born in 1944, and Fred Preston, born in 1948.

Eva worked for 30 years as secretary at Glenwood Methodist Church in Tyler. She and Joe helped found Wesley Methodist Church, which became their spiritual and social center. In addition to participating in Sunday school and potluck suppers, they played dominoes and other games with church friends. Once the boys left for college, Eva and Joe traveled with friends through much of the western United States and Canada.

Family and friends were a priority. Eva and Joe celebrated holidays, birthdays, weddings, and reunions with family members on both sides. Everyone looked forward to eating her superb cornbread dressing and pies of every flavor. She was always on the telephone keeping up with the day-to-day details of friends and family because she truly cared about what was going on in their lives, whether they liked it or not. She laughed easily and often recounted the dramas of her friends' lives as vividly as those on her favorite TV show, "As the World Turns."

She demonstrated her faith and caring by looking after ailing relatives, including Joe and sister Glenn, as well as long-time friends in nursing homes. After Joe died in 1998, Eva spent most Saturdays with women friends at the garden nursery and tea room in Bullard. More recently, she lived with son Fred and his wife JuDee in Bastrop, until a broken hip in December 2017 forced her into rehab. She died in the New Haven Assisted Living Center just 12 days away from turning 97.

Eva is survived by son Wayne and wife Barbara, and son Fred and wife Judee. Eva had four grandchildren, Alan, Phaedra and son-in-law Neil Perantie, Laura and son-in-law Israel Pantoja, and Crystal and son-in-law Brian Baldinger, as well as one great-grandchild, Harold. Her many nieces and nephews remember "Auntie Eva" and "Uncle Joe" as "two of the sweetest people one could ever imagine."

Visitation will be Saturday, Oct. 6, from 3 to 5 p.m. at Marrs-Jones-Newby Funeral Home, 505 Old Austin Highway, Bastrop. A memorial service will be held at Pollard United Methodist Church in Tyler at 1 p.m. Oct. 27, followed by a gravesite service at Rose Hill Cemetery at 2 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made in her name to the Alzheimer's Association, http://www.txalz.org/.

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