Laura M. Russ

She grew up in High Point, North Carolina and graduated from High Point Senior High School in 1958. She attended High Point College from 1958-1960 where she was an active member of Kappa Delta sorority.

When her father went to fight for his country in Europe in WWII, she and her mother lived with her beloved grandmother, Laura Thompson Leonard until his return. As she was growing up, Laura played the piano, sang in school and church choirs, and spent many summers at the beach and the lake with her many cousins and lifelong friends from high school and college. She also worked at the Malpass-owned grocery stores where she served many customers and helped with the bookkeeping and accounting.

She raised her daughters in St. Louis, Missouri and Houston, Texas where she taught her daughters to read, appreciate art, music, history, and the theater. She was active in their education serving as room mother for several years at the girls’ elementary school. She was a great cook learning from both her mother and grandmother and her family birthday cakes were legendary.

She returned to the workforce when her daughters were older, and had a successful career in personnel and management consulting. She and her beloved husband, Richard, also owned several businesses and were partners as real estate agents for several years in Tucson, Arizona. A particular highlight of her professional life was as a federal civil service employee in the US House of Representatives Radio and Television Correspondence Gallery in Washington, DC.

She and her husband retired from civil service but she never stopped learning, living, and contributing to the world, both personally and professionally. For leisure, she loved board games and played cards with her children, friends, and her brother and sister-in-law, Bill and Shirley Malpass. Laura was a voracious reader, often staying up all night to finish a great book. She loved the beach and spent many summers in Galveston and Rockport Texas. As a lifelong learner herself, she understood the value of education and returned to work in the school and district offices and as a substitute teacher for elementary schools for the Humble Independent School district. A world traveler, she traveled with her husband to Egypt, Israel, London, cruised the Caribbean, and most recently cruised the Mediterranean visiting the Vatican and Pompeii in Italy and the sites from Greek antiquity.

Laura is preceded in death by the love of her life, her husband of 36 years, Richard Denny Russ, her father, William “Clarence” Malpass; mother, Christine Leonard Malpass, and sister, Janet Lynn Malpass.

She is survived by her children, Sharon Christine Mcloughlin-Michalec, and Donna Ellen Venable-Finch and Richard “Rick” Denny Russ, Jr. She was the best Mimi to her grandchildren, Bridget McLoughlin Ferguson, Laura Finch, and Rachael Finch. She also got to hold and love on her great grandsons, Connor and Brennan Ferguson.

She will be missed by her brother William “Bill” Clarence Malpass Jr. of Atlanta, Georgia, sisters-in-law, Emily Russ Patch, Julia Russ Sullivan of Kingwood, Texas and brother-in-law, E. Jack Russ of Oxford, Mississippi. She was “Aunt Laura” to many nieces and nephews who said she could light up a room and “Cousin Laura Jean” to her extended family that enjoyed her spirit and love of life.

A celebration of her life will be held Saturday, June 1, 2024 at Kingwood Funeral Home, 22800 Highway 59 North, Kingwood, Texas at 3:00 PM. Light refreshments will be served immediately after the service.

The family wishes to extend heartfelt appreciation to her caregivers at Carol Ann's Home San Antonio, Texas, the Heart of Texas Hospice, the clinicians at Biggs Institute for Alzheimer's Disease and Research. In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to the Alzheimer's Association.