Helen Marie Chinn

Helen Marie Blades Chinn passed away Sunday, July 24, due to complications from surgery. She was two weeks shy of her 91st birthday. Marie was born in Waldron, Arkansas, on Aug. 5, 1925, to Edith Roberts and Selby Blades. She grew up in Dallas, where her first two children, William M. (Billy) Martin and Barbara (Bobbie) Martin Showers, were born. In 1948, she moved to Houston with her infant son Jack Richard Shook and soon met the man who would be the love of her life, Lloyd P. Chinn. They married in 1956 and shared 37 happy years together. They watched the Spring Branch area grow from a community on Houston's western edge to a close-in neighborhood where they brought up their son Lloyd Blades Chinn. Preceding Marie in death were her husband Lloyd, her oldest son Billy and her daughter Bobbie. Survivors include her sons Jack Shook and wife Barbara, Sugar Land; and Lloyd Chinn and partner Sandra Pullman, New York City; grandchildren and great-grandchildren Dalton (Mike) Martin and wife Alison and their children Remington and Kaitlin; Robyn Shook and daughter Stoney Dillard; Daniel Shook and wife Crusita Vasquez and sons Nicholas and David; and Lloyd Chinn and Caroline Chinn; brother Selby "Rusty" Blades and his wife Vella and; sister Louise Hope; and many nieces and nephews.

A memorial service is scheduled at the Village of Tanglewood, 1600 Augusta, Houston, Texas 77057, at 2.30 p.m. Saturday, July 30. Family internment services will be private. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests a contribution to the American Heart Association.