Grace was a devoted wife and mother, an industrious worker, and a caring friend to many. She inspired her children to believe in themselves and doted on her grandchildren. She loved her family above all else.
She was born Grace Dorothy Klein on May 6, 1926, in Kearney, Nebraska, to Robert and Cumming Anne. Grace lived on the family farm until moving with her parents and siblings to San Antonio at age nine. She was the third of seven children, and learned from an early age to care for her younger brothers. She loved to read, and taught her brothers reading and writing.
Grace met her future husband, Bud Fouga, at age 14. Bud fell in love immediately, but as Grace was still too young to date, they remained friends until WWII intervened and separated them. Meanwhile, Grace was in high school, enjoying movies and live productions almost weekly. She loved big band and popular vocal music. Tommy Dorsey and Frank Sinatra were particular favorites.
Upon graduating at age 17 from Fox Tech High School, and unbeknownst to her mother, Grace applied for a job as a clerk at the Navy Department, then took the job against her mom’s wishes, and moved to D.C. for the duration of the war.
Grace and Bud corresponded throughout the war while he was overseas until Bud became a POW in Germany. Upon his repatriation, Grace broke a date with another fellow so that she could see him. The two were inseparable, and married on March 22, 1947, in San Antonio. They would remain married and devoted to each other for 64 years until Bud passed in 2011, aged 90.
In their early years of marriage, they both worked: Grace in a gift shop and Bud as the night manager of a hotel. In 1950 they moved to Austin for Bud to attend college at UT. Grace worked to put him through college, and helped him with his studies. While in Austin, Grace delivered their first child, Steve, in 1952.
Grace and Bud moved to Houston after his graduation, where Bud had taken a job as an accountant for an engineering firm. Grace stayed at home to raise Steve. Bud’s work took the family to Salt Lake City in 1956, and there Grace delivered their second child, Sue, in 1957. When they had the opportunity to move back to Houston in 1960, they jumped at it, and remained there or thereabouts, for the rest of their lives, happy to be back in Texas.
While Bud worked at a paying job until his retirement in 1984, Grace worked at least as hard at home. She cooked, cleaned and ran the household, and taught the kids through direct instruction and by example how to do the same. When Sue was nine and Steve was old enough to take care of her after school and during the summers, Grace was chomping at the bit to return to the workforce. She believed that working was a blessing and a duty. Once again, unbeknownst to her family, Grace applied for and accepted a job, this time against Bud’s wishes. She would work at Texas Commerce Bank part-time, while maintaining her role as homemaker and helping put two children through college, until she retired in 1988. The kids grew up and raised families of their own, Steve giving her granddaughter Maddy, and Sue, grandsons Zach and Ryan.
The grandkids were Grace’s greatest joy! She adored them, and she and Bud frequently cared for them when the parents were away, taking them to the Kemah Boardwalk, the Butterfly Museum, Rainforest Cafe, and Dickens on the Strand, or watching movies with them at home. The grandchildren returned their love, feeling almost as much at home with them as with their own parents.
In 2000, when Grace was 74, she and Bud moved to a new home in Katy and, as it turned out, she had plenty of joy, tribulations, service, and adventure yet to come. Grace and Bud had always enjoyed traveling, and in retirement they visited Hawaii and various spots around the continental U.S., as well as Canada, Mexico, England, France, and Italy. They often took day trips to Galveston for fishing, shopping, and dinners at Gaido’s and Hill’s Pier 19. Grace and Bud were relaxed and happy in retirement until, after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s, Bud declined to the point that he required full-time care. Grace became his primary caregiver and, while in her 80s, gave him the same loving care she would eventually receive from Sue.
When Bud passed, she continued to maintain her household and, with help from Steve and Sue, shopped for herself until in her 90s. But then came Hurricane Harvey! As the home she loved flooded, Zach and the Coast Guard rescued her by boat. She called it “The biggest adventure of my life!” But that ended the Katy era. Grace moved into Sue’s home, where she lived comfortably for the rest of her life.
Grace had an independent streak, a need to work and feel useful, a sense of duty to family, gave excellent advice, and always, always put others ahead of herself. She took a great interest in her children’s friends, hosting them for lunches and dinners in childhood and young adulthood and even meeting and enjoying Sue’s friends late in life. She baked and delivered holiday treats to her neighbors wherever she lived, and to co-workers. Grace was beloved by friends and family, and a person particularly well-suited to her name.
Grace Fouga was preceded in death by many of the people she cared about most: Her parents and stepfather; husband Buddy; brothers Bobby, Glenn, Bucky and Jim; cherished sister Ruth; sisters-in-law Cissy, Beth, Dee Dee, Barbara, and Mickey; brothers-in-law George and Bobby; and nearly all of her friends, the result of an amazingly strong constitution leading to a life of 96 years.
She is survived by son Steve Fouga and his wife Suzanne Simmons, of Galveston; daughter Sue Marnitz and her husband Brad, of Houston; granddaughter Madison Fouga, of Fort Worth; grandsons Zach and Ryan Marnitz, of Houston; step-grandson Daniel Simmons, of Galveston; brother Butch Klein and his wife Peggy Sue, of San Antonio; sister-in-law Carol Klein of Tustin, CA, brother-in-law Gib Miller, of Appleton, WI, and a wonderful extended family of nieces, nephews, and their children and grand-children.
The family would like to thank Mona Hampton, Marie Hogan, Porsche Holmes, Diana Kochan, Jacki Brennan, Ashlynn Kennedy, Roxanne Nevarvette and Nubia Blasingame for the expert and loving help they gave Sue over the years in caring for Grace.
Grace’s funeral service will be held at Memorial Oaks Funeral Home, 13001 Katy Freeway, Houston on Saturday, October 29, at 12 p.m. A graveside service will follow. Attendees are invited to celebrate Grace’s life at a lunch at Escalante’s Town & Country afterward.
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