Mary Catherine Custer Dodson

1921 - 2013

Mary Catherine Custer Dodson, loving wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother, died peacefully Tuesday evening, April 16, 2013, during her 91st year. Service: 11 a.m. Friday in the chapel at Robertson Mueller Harper, the Rev. Verne Fuqua officiating. Mrs. Dodson will be laid to rest next to her husband, Bill, in Antelope Cemetery, Jack County. Visitation: Family and friends will be received 10 to 11 a.m. Friday at the funeral home. Memorials: Consideration of contributions to a charity of one's choice, in her memory, is suggested. Born Nov. 22, 1921, in Jefferson, Iowa, Mary Catherine was the daughter of William Elzea and Mabel Cassie Wolf Custer. She was the great-great-niece of Gen. George Armstrong Custer. Mary Catherine grew up on the family farm doing the usual chores of farm life. She graduated from Jefferson High School before moving to Arizona in 1940. She often said, "I wouldn't take anything for my childhood because it built love and character." While in Tucson, Ariz., she met her future husband, William Woodrow Dodson, who was stationed there in the Army Air Corps. They had to put their wedding plans on hold due to Pearl Harbor, but married on Feb. 15, 1942. Mary Catherine was a secretary and accountant. She retired in 1982 from the Fort Worth Independent School District after 22 years of service. She was a member of the Fort Worth Educational Secretaries Association, Texas Educational Secretaries Association, University United Methodist Church, its Clark Class and the Super Adults, and Co-Wi-Bus. She was preceded in death by her parents; husband, Bill, who died in 2003; and siblings. Survivors: In addition to her daughter, Mary Karen Greene of Dallas, Mary Catherine was survived by her son, William Kenneth Dodson and his wife, Christina, of Fort Worth; she was "Da Da" to her grandchildren, Leah Kelly Greene Tepera, Ryan William Greene and his wife, Liza Park Greene, and Sheryle Crystal Dodson Gillihan and her husband, Michael Glenn; and great-grandchildren, Sarah Miquela Gillihan, Christina Allison Gillihan, Louis Parker Tepera, Leah Peyton Tepera, Ryder William Greene, Riley Catherine Greene and Charles Park Greene.