Funeral services for Grace Briley Belich, 89, of Brownwood, formerly of the Ebony Community in Mills County, will be held Tuesday, October 6 at 1:00pm at Davis-Morris Funeral Home Chapel with Dr. Don Vinzant officiating. Burial will be in the Ebony Cemetery under the direction of the Davis-Morris Funeral Home. Visitation will be from 6:00 to 8:00 pm Monday at Davis-Morris Funeral Home.
Grace passed away peacefully on Thursday, October 1, in Brownwood. She was born Grace Wilmeth Briley on Sunday July 11, 1920 in Dallas, Texas the second daughter of John R. and Clementine Wilmeth Briley. During the depression her family moved to the family’s farm and ranch where she lived part of her childhood in the Ebony community in Mills County. Going to Fort Worth to stay with Aunt Grace, her namesake, and her Uncle John she graduated from Pascal High School in 1937. She attended Daniel Baker College in Brownwood for a year and then transferred to Texas State College for Women (now Texas Women’s University) where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Music Education in 1941.
She married William A. Belich, then a SGT in the United States Army in Emporia, Kansas on Christmas Eve, 1943. After her husband graduated from college in 1950 his career took them to El Paso where they raised their family. She retired in 1980 after a 36 year career of teaching music and language arts in the public schools of Zephyr, Brownwood, Lubbock and El Paso. She was honored as an outstanding teacher in El Paso in 1958 and in 1978. On their retirement they moved to her family’s ranch along Buffalo creek in Mills County.
She was a member of the Austin Avenue Church of Christ. She enjoyed her family, working to improve the ranch’s infrastructure, gardening and participating in community activities. She was a member of the Omega Chapter of Delta Kappa Gamma and was recently recognized as a fifty year member of this honorary teacher Society. She was also a member of Retired Teachers Association of Brown County, the Mills County Historical Society and the Ebony Community Senior Citizen Club.
Survivors include her sons William A. Belich Jr. and his wife Charlotte of Brownwood, John W. Belich and his wife Ruth of San Antonio, her grandsons William A. Belich III of Manheim, Pennsylvania, James R. Belich and his wife Hasmik of Fort Worth, and Benjamin Trae Belich and his wife Jackie and her two great-grandsons Caden James and Benjamin Luke of Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
She was preceded in death by her husband Bill and her sister Ruth Wilmeth Mitchell.
Condolences, memories, and tributes can be left for the family at www.mem.com