Emily Holder Southard

Emily Victoria Holder Southard passed away peacefully, age 100 and 10 months, basking in the love of family and friends.  All agreed that hers was an exceptional life well lived.

All her life, beginning at a very early age, Emily helped others.  As a child, her mother would send her to the homes of relatives, neighbors, and friends who, because of illness or a new baby or a death, were in need of assistance and comfort.  Emily would stay the afternoon, the night, or weeks at a time. This theme held throughout her long life.

Emily was a unique combination of some of the best features of her parents and namesake grandmother.  She carried forward the bottomless generosity, deep concern for others, abiding faith, and joyfulness of her mother, Bessie Holder.  Her inventiveness and desire to do things well came from her father, Verlin Holder.  Her strength of body and of character echoed that of her grandmother, Emma Cockerham Tucker (aka "Granny Tucker"), who helped raise her and her siblings.  Emily built on this foundation with her own sharp intellect, quick wit, perceptive observation, curiosity, openness, love of people, sense of humor, patience, and artistic talents. Like her mother, Emily taught us that gratitude and faith keep us "on the sunny side of life".  Emily said, "Mama never prayed for anything; all her prayers were prayers of thanks."

Emily was born at home in Surry County, the sixth of Verlin and Bessie's ten children, and the first child to be born in the new frame house that Verlin built.  Emily said that at age thirteen, she "gave my heart and my life to the Lord" when she was baptized by Preacher Hoffman in William White's fish pond in 1934.

She grew up in a time when subsistence farming by large families was how our small community functioned -- when self-sufficiency depended on hard work and deep human connectiveness, not on electricity, running water, or phone service.

After attending Mountain Park High School, Emily married Garvey Braxton Southard in June 1941.  By early December, Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor, prompting the U.S. to join World War II.  Her husband, brothers, neighbors were called to serve. During the war years, Emily worked at Chatham Manufacturing, boarding in Elkin.  After the war, on 31 July 1944, Emily and Garvey's daughter Wandene was born in Elkin hospital. Sadly, the infant died eight days later from birth complications. Their baby was one of the first graves at Bessie's Chapel.

Garvey and Emily built their house in 1950. During the mid-1950s Emily taught Sunday school to young adults at Bessie's Chapel, and was involved in the Surry County Home Demonstration Club (serving as Secretary in 1951-2).  She became a licensed Cosmetologist in 1957, and had her own hair salon for many years. Emily cultivated new friends and embraced new experiences all her life. It will surprise no one that Emily won an award for extemporaneous speaking at a Dale Carnegie Class she took in Mt. Airy, or that she learned to swim at age 69.

Emily left a remarkable physical legacy as well -- her personal compilation of over seventy notebooks of genealogical documentation. She was an early member of the Surry County Genealogical Association, serving that organization as co-Librarian in 1985, as Secretary in 1987-1988, as co-Corresponding Secretary in 1992. In 1995, Emily wrote and self-published Remembering Granny Tucker, a biography of her grandmother. Emily also quietly paid for many monuments and headstones at various cemeteries, so that ancestors would not be lost to memory.

After her husband died, Emily continued to live at home until a stroke at 97 left her unable to walk. Afterwards, she resided at Chatham Nursing in Elkin, working with therapists until just before her death. Characteristically, she embraced Chatham Nursing as her new home and her new family.

Emily was preceded in death by her husband of 64 years, Garvey Southard; their infant daughter, Wandene; her grandmother, Emily Cockerham Tucker; her parents, William Verlin and Martha Ettis "Bessie" Tucker Holder; and siblings Raymond V. Holder, Phosie H. Cockerham, Fred A. Holder, Roger J. Holder, R. Quentin Holder, Betty H. Guyer, Bonnie H. Burchette, and Wilda H. Gentry.

Surviving are her brother Reeves A. Holder, brother-in-law Joe B. Guyer Sr., many nieces and nephews, great-nieces and nephews, great-great-nieces and nephews, and a wealth of dear friends worldwide, including Darlene Markland and Etheleen Sehen.

A graveside service will be held Sunday, October 23, 2022 at 3:00 p.m. at Bessie's Chapel Baptist Church Cemetery, 622 Bessie’s Chapel Church Road.  The family requests that masks be worn to protect against Covid. Emily will lie-in-state at Elkin Funeral Service, 560 Hwy 268 West, Elkin, on Saturday from 1:00 – 4:00 p.m. (family will not be present).

In lieu of flowers, Emily requested donations for the Bessie's Chapel Church Cemetery Fund, c/o A.V. Cockerham, 114 Calloway Lane, State Road, NC 28676, or Mt.  Valley Hospice, 968 N. Bridge St, Elkin, NC 28621.