Jo Marie Adams

Mrs. Adams, known to friends and family as “Jo,” was born Jo Marie Schear on October 10,1925 in Whitesboro, Texas to Lester M. Schear and Margaret Roberta Schear. Shortly following her birth, the family moved to Tyler, Texas where Jo was raised and went to school with her sister and brother, graduating from John Tyler High School. She worked for a time as a legal secretary and for a company then known as Continental Oil Company. Sometime during the early 1950s she became smitten with a young geologist with Tidewater Oil Company, whom she met in the elevator of the building where she worked, Wynne M. (“Buzz”) Adams.

She and Buzz married on June 30, 1952 in Tyler and thereafter they followed the trajectory of his career as an exploration geologist, which took them through assignments in Jackson, Mississippi, Houston, Texas, Midland, Texas, back to Tyler, back to Houston, and finally to Los Angeles, CA, where she and Buzz lived for the twenty (20) years prior to his death in 1992. Along the way she was a warmhearted, conscientious homemaker and mother to their two (2) sons, Andrew and Russell.

Jo was a life long Presbyterian and reflected the love of Christ in her compassionate and sacrificial care for Buzz as he died of leukemia; for her mother, Roberta, through her death following several strokes; and for her sister, Patsy, as she died from complications of advanced cerebral palsy. Jo was additionally a loving (and very patient!) Mom and Grandma to her sons and grandsons, who will greatly miss her thoughtful conversation and kind words. She loved working crossword puzzles, was very well read and especially fond of all things British, including Anthony Trollope novels, Agatha Christie mysteries, and the Downton Abbey and Poldark TV series. She was in addition an avid Texas Rangers fan. (And long before they won the World Series!).

Jo was preceded in death by her husband, her parents, her brother Robert (“Bob”) Schear, and her sister, Patsy Schear.

She leaves behind her sons, Andrew W. Adams and his wife, Janis; and Russell J. Adams and his wife, Karen. Also missing her are her grandsons: Joseph Wynne Adams, and his wife Anna, Matthew Patrick Adams, James Arthur Adams and Nathan Henry Adams. She will also be missed by Russell’s step-daughter, Taylor Brueckner, and her husband Bobby and their daughters Brynley and Addison. She is additionally survived by her great-grandsons: Jack Andrew Adams and Luke Allen Adams, as well as her nephew Larry R. Schear and his wife, Alice, of Dallas, Texas, and nieces, Anne Marie Adams, of San Antonio, Texas, Cathy Zimmerman (Jim), Pat Florence (M.J.), and Debbie Miller, all of Tyler, Texas, as well as many grandnieces and grandnephews.

The family would like to extend special thanks to all of the caregivers at Plantation Estates in Porter, Texas who cared for our Mom in her final days.

A funeral service for Jo will be held Wednesday, April 3, 2024 from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM at Kingwood Funeral Home, 22800 Highway 59 North, Kingwood, TX 77339, with a burial to follow at a later date in San Antonio, Texas.