Born on in August 1, 1936 to George and Louise Anderson, Berniece grew up in Dallas, Texas and graduated from Hardin Simmons University in 1958. During her time at Hardin Simmons, she worked as a cafeteria cashier where she encountered an eager young man, fumbling to show her his meal ticket, who spilled a glass of tea in her lap. The young man, Jim Thompson, was worried that the episode would doom his chances with Berniece. However, he persevered, and the result was 61 amazing years of marriage and two sons, Brian and Mike.
Teaching and singing have always been an important part of Berniece’s life. She taught business subjects at Big Spring High School and Bryan High School for more than 35 years. For 25 years, she taught the Business Women’s Bible Study at First Baptist Church, Bryan. She had a wonderful talent for sesquipedalian prose that made her sound supercalifragalisticly precocious. Berniece also had a wonderfully sweet singing voice and often broke out in song at even the slightest provocation. She loved singing old hymns and was a long-time member of her church choir. While Alzheimer’s unfairly robbed her much too soon of many of her memories, she was able to sing “Amazing Grace” until the very end.
Berniece was preceded in death by her son, Brian and her brothers, Jimmy and Johnny.
Her survivors include her husband; Jim Thompson, her son Mike Thompson, his wife Shari, and children Jeff, Kylie, and Kelsey, her daughter-in-law; Kelly Thompson and children Amy and Cassie, her great-grandson; Riley, her brothers; Alfred, his wife Joyce, Jerry his wife Joey, her sister-in-law Belle; nieces and nephews, in-laws and countless chosen loved ones.
Due to precautionary measures, a celebration of life service will be held at a later date.
In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to Gideons International at Gideons.org/gift.
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