May 24, 1932 —February 28, 2021
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Virginia Marlene Holbrook Fry, age 88, long-time resident of Austin but more recently from Georgetown, died on Sunday, February 28, 2021, after an eight-year struggle with Alzheimer’s Disease.
She was born at Parkland Hospital in Dallas on May 24, 1932, to Alva Pierce Holbrook and Lillian Marie Whitehead Holbrook. Both of her parents were deaf, so she grew up a native speaker of American Sign Language. She graduated as salutatorian of her class from Bertram High School in 1949 and moved to Austin where she attended NixonClay Commercial College.
On April 20, 1952, she married Edmund Heinatz Fry at the Bertram Baptist Church, and they began their married life in Marble Falls, Texas, with brief residences in San Antonio and Taylor before moving to Austin in 1957.
She was the business manager for Fry’s Air Conditioning and Heating from 1959 until the business was sold in 1993.
Shortly after moving to Austin, she became a founding member of the Cameron Road Church of Christ where she was an active member, secretary, and Sunday school teacher until the family moved to north Austin and joined the Westover Hills Church of Christ. She served as a leader at the north Austin Bible Study Fellowship for several years.
She loved to cook and to entertain. She made the best chicken and dumplings anyone would ever want to eat, and she was not afraid to get her hands dirty in butchering a hog and a deer, running the meat through a grinder, mixing it with herbs, chilies and spices, and stuffing it all into natural casings to make sausage.
She is survived by her husband of 68 years, Edmund Heinatz Fry; brother James (Elaine) Holbrook; children Richard (Vicki) Fry, Randal (David Olivier) Fry, and David (Pegi) Fry; grandchildren Steven (Jayla) Fry, Allison (Clint) Savage, Sara (Meador) Hall, Bailey Fry and Kimberly Fry; great-grandchildren Brook Fry, Ava Fry, Lexie Savage, Ellie Savage, and Hazel Hall; and numerous nieces, nephews and cousins.
She is preceded in death by her parents, and her younger brother, Carl Hubert ‘Buck’ Holbrook.
Her private service will take place at the Smithwick Church of Christ, followed by burial at the Smithwick Cemetery. Services will be handled by Cook-Walden Davis Funeral Home located at 2900 Williams Drive in Georgetown.
Special thanks to Armando Flores and Lucy Montalvo who lovingly cared for her in their home for the last six years of her life.
