Mrs. Mary Mell Walker

A native Atlantan and graduate of Agnes Scott College, she grew up on Techwood Drive near the Georgia Tech campus and as a young woman worked at Georgia Tech for eight years, only solidifying her lifelong love of “the Institute.”

She and Hap married in late 1957, had son Daniel in 1959, and thanks to Hap’s early career lived in several states before settling in Charleston, South Carolina in 1963. Mary Mell left the stay-at-home role and re-entered the workforce in the early 1970s, having numerous secretarial and office administrative positions in Charleston and later in Atlanta into the 1990s. She particularly enjoyed assignments of “temp work,” the opportunities to meet a great variety of people

A lifelong Presbyterian who found solace in the Calvinist emphasis upon the sovereignty of God, she was an active member of North Avenue Presbyterian Church early in her life and again later, was an active member of First (Scots) Presbyterian Church in Charleston, and in her later years was blessed to be a member of Hope and then Covenant Presbyterian Church in Tallahassee.

Great friends and a love of reading shaped her life. If you were a friend, you were a friend for life; she cherished her precious friends in Atlanta, Charleston, and Tallahassee. Until the last days of her life, she loved to read – not only for entertainment, but also to unceasingly develop her Christian faith, because Christians are to love God with all one’s mind as well as heart and soul. If you read the Bible, monthly devotionals such as “Table Talk” and “Our Daily Bread,” magazines such as “Modern Reformation,” or books by R.C. Sproul, you have a kindred spirit in Mary Mell.

Mary Mell’s faith was no academic exercise. It grounded her as she persevered through numerous health challenges in her latter 50s and beyond, defeating stage 4 breast cancer in her early 80s along the way.

She is survived by her son, Daniel Walker; nieces Andrea Britt, Ellen Bradford, and Nancy Walker; and, nephews Joel Fleming and Herbert Leeming. Predeceasing her were her husband, Harry Walker; her brother, Joe Fleming; and her parents, Jimmie Johnson Fleming and Andy Fleming. Mary Mell also wished to acknowledge some of her wonderful friends of many decades, among them being Jane and Jimmy Snyder, Lenora Kirkland, Lillian Loomis, Merrile Kinard, Doris Rutherford, Minnie Whitaker, and Lucy Worthen, and those who predeceased Mary Mell, among them being Anne and Ken Long, Anne and Tom Eskew, Roger Howell, Mary and Bob Atkinson, Ralph Rutherford, Cecil Kirkland, Ray Kinard, and Will Loomis.

Mary Mell will be buried alongside Hap in Tallahassee. A graveside service will be held at Culley’s MeadowWood Funeral Home and Memorial Park at 700 Timberlane Road in Tallahassee on Saturday, Oct. 10, at 1 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, contributions to any of the following are encouraged: Samaritan’s Purse; Ligonier Ministries; Second Harvest of the Big Bend; Hillsdale College; and, Grove City College.