Virginia Womack McMillion

Virginia was born Dec. 2, 1921, in Paris, Texas, to Sam Womack and Johnnybel Holt Womack. She grew up at the Womack farm at Slate Shoals, north of Paris, and in Paris. She attended Paris Community College, then taught school at Slate Shoals. She graduated from the University of Texas in 1943, then worked at The Paris News. In 1944, she went to Miami, Florida, where she worked as a reporter and feature writer for The Miami Herald. She returned to Texas in 1945.

Virginia was working in public relations at the Dallas County Community Chest when she met Bonner McMillion, a reporter at The Dallas Times-Herald. They married on Nov. 16, 1947. Bonner and Virginia owned and published three central Texas newspapers from the early 1950s to the mid-1970s: The Elgin Courier in Elgin; The Brazos Valley Times in Marlin; and The Fayette County Record in La Grange, which they owned from 1965 to 1976. Virginia took an active role in the newspapers, while also raising three children. She covered public meetings, and wrote numerous articles, including a series about the impact of the Fayette Power Plant on the communities near La Grange. Virginia also made significant contributions to Bonner's three published novels: The Lot of Her Neighbors, The Long Ride Home, and So Long at the Fair. Bonner relied on Virginia not just for editing, but for advice on theme, content, characterization, plot, and pacing. Virginia was invaluable in her husband's successful career.

Virginia loved poetry, genealogy, politics, and travel. She wrote poems from an early age, several of which were published. She researched, and distributed to her extended family, histories of her mother's family, the Holts; her father's family, the Womacks; and Bonner's family, the McMillions. Virginia was an ardent Democrat, and followed current events closely. She was a member of the First Unitarian Universalist Church in Austin, and a charter member, along with Bonner, of the Unitarian Fellowship in Waco. And she was adventurous. In addition to traveling to Europe twice with Bonner, she traveled twice by herself. In later years she traveled to Miami, where she lived in the 1940s, and to San Antonio, a city she loved so much that she wrote a poem about it.

Virginia was preceded in death by her parents and her two sisters: Eloise, who died before Virginia was born, and Betty Sudduth, who died in 1991. Virginia was also preceded in death by her husband of 66 years, Bonner McMillion.

Virginia is survived by son Mark McMillion, and two daughters: Melissa McMillion and husband Wayne Eisen of Pinole, CA; and Robin McMillion and husband Tim Jurgensen of Austin. She is also survived by grandsons Ariel McMillion and partner Ann-Sofie Ivarsson of Goteborg, Sweden; Andrew McMillion and wife Sana Majeed McMillion of Arnes, Norway; John Joseph McMillion and partner Jeanette Jernberg of Goteborg, Sweden; Ari N. Schulman of Austin; and Leonard Bonner Eisen of Philadelphia, PA; granddaughters Anna Virginia Holter-Stoen of Oslo, Norway; Leslie Walter and husband Bryan Walter of Omaha, NE; and Sierra Eisen of Charlottsville, Virginia. She is also survived by great-grandchildren Deen Majeed McMillion, Theo Jernberg McMillion, and Cora Walter; and nieces Jeanne Waters, Kay Zagst, and Lyn LeJeune.

The family will receive friends from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. on Friday, April 22, 2016 at Weed-Corley-Fish Funeral Home, 3125 N. Lamar Blvd.

Funeral services will be held at 1:00 p.m. on Saturday, April 23, 2016 at First Unitarian Universalist Church, 4700 Grover in Austin, TX. Interment will follow at Capital Parks Cemetery in Pflugerville.

Virginia had a happy and fulfilling life, many friends, and a huge influence on her family. In her poem "Beyond the Hurricane," which she wrote for Bonner, she said,

"They are boarding up the windows of our lives back home

And the oaks of our youth are falling, falling.

But we have made it

To this safe place."