John Bracken Lewis

Family Graveside Services will be held on Monday, Dec. 14, 2020 at 11:00 AM at the Midway Cemetery in the Hodges Community north of Abilene with Dr. Jeff Reid officiating. Services will be under

the direction of Elliott-Hamil Funeral Home.

A native West Texan, Lewis was born near Roscoe in Nolan County, on June 15, 1926, as the next to youngest of eight children born to tenant farmers Noah Preston Lewis and Ora Bell Garrett. He attended schools in Nolan and Fisher counties before graduating from Sweetwater High School in 1943.

Upon completing high school, he worked at U.S. Gypsum in Sweetwater before joining the Merchant Marines in 1944. After receiving his training at the Sheepshead Bay Maritime Training Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., he made 13 trans-Atlantic trips delivering foodstuffs, livestock and oil to war-ravaged Europe and returning U.S. troops back to the states. His ships were the Fullerton Hills, Clarksville Victory, Somme, Wauhatchia, and Henry Gibbins.

After his discharge in 1947, he returned to Sweetwater where he began work in the wholesale warehouse for International Harvester and Co. In early 1949 he transferred to Abilene to work as a retail parts salesman for the local IH dealership.

Shortly after moving to Abilene, he met Edna Jurdene Gentry of Hodges and they were married on Sept. 4, 1949. They lived in Abilene until 1953 when they moved to Midland, where he became parts manager for the fledgling Wes-Tex Equipment Co., an IH franchise which served the oil business in the Permian Basin. By the time he retired from the parts business in 1975, he had built Wes-Tex Equipment into the leading International truck parts dealership in West Texas.

Lewis and his wife had two sons, Preston Lewis and Marc Lewis, and put both through Baylor University. While in Midland, he and his family were members of Calvary Baptist Church and then First Baptist Church.

After he left the parts business, he and his wife moved to a quarter section of land near Hodges, where he farmed cotton and raised an orchard of 60 pecan trees, which he managed even after he later leased out his farmland. After their return to the Big Country, he and his wife joined the Pioneer Drive Baptist Church in Abilene.

Lewis enjoyed hunting, fishing and outdoor activities all of his life. After retirement, he loved playing dart ball in local church leagues and was the home run champion more than a dozen times. He loved traveling and camping with his family as well as building getaway cabins on Lake Brownwood and in Ruidoso, N.M. Most of all, he enjoyed providing for his family, which gradually expanded to four grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.

As head of a family of boys, he welcomed Harriet Irene Kocher of State College, Pa., and Lee Ann Jolly of Midland into the family as daughters-in-law. Preston and Harriet Lewis would become parents of Scott Bracken Lewis, who married Celeste Alane Sunderland, and Melissa Irene Lewis, who married John Andrew Kemp. Marc and Lee Ann Lewis would become the parents of Lauren Michelle Lewis, who married Daniel Steward, and Jason Michael Lewis, who married Kelly Lynn McTavish. His grandchildren came to call him “Pa,” his treasured nickname for more than 40 years.

His great-grandchildren were Hannah Alane Lewis, James Aidan Steward, Avery Kate Steward, Cora Belle Kemp, Miriam Faith Lewis, Carys Anne Kemp, Jackson Josiah Kemp and Hudson Marshall Lewis, as well as the late Benjamin Scott Lewis. He is also survived by his younger sister Juanita Merle Roberts of Fort Worth.

John Bracken Lewis was preceded in death by parents Noah Preston Lewis and Ora Bell Garrett; siblings Mildred Ruth McRorey, Grace Marie Ammons, Edna Myrtle McRorey, Carl Preston Lewis, Ella Mae Whitworth and Ray Franklin Lewis; and great grandson Benjamin Scott Lewis.

John Bracken Lewis was a loving husband, a caring provider for his family, a welcoming father-in-law and a devoted grandfather and great grandfather. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorials be made to Baptist Retirement Community, San Angelo, or Pioneer Drive Baptist Church, Abilene.

Please visit back to view online photo tribute. Please share condolences and memories to the Lewis family on the online guestbook.