TERRELLITA MAVERICK

1926 - 2021

Daughter of San Antonio, world-class Maverick, and all-around free spirit who was "feisty" till the end!

Terrellita Fontaine Maverick (1/10/1926–5/20/2021) was born in San Antonio, Texas to Maury Maverick Sr. and Terrell Dobbs Maverick.

Her life was full, living in a variety of places beginning with her early childhood near Brackenridge Park where she was introduced to elephants and chimps at the zoo, played with friends at the Japanese Tea Garden, and attended Lamar Elementary School.

In 1935, she moved with her parents and brother, Maury Maverick Jr., to Washington DC when her father was elected to congress. She advised the first lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, to create the first congressional children's party. She loved telling the story of President Roosevelt giving her his dessert (a chocolate bonbon) at a dinner party. She helped with secretarial work in her father's office with Lyndon Johnson at the age of eleven. Through growing up in a political family Terrellita met five Presidents.

In 1939, when her father was elected Mayor of San Antonio, the family was moved back home. She graduated from Jefferson High School, then attended Penn Hall in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania where at 17 she also learned to fly airplanes solo. Later, she attended the University of North Carolina and married the father of her first three children. Returning to San Antonio, she received her degree in Journalism at Trinity University.

She moved and remarried in Austin, where her fourth child was born, and where she was intensely involved with the Democratic Party.

She moved to the San Francisco Bay Area with her two sons, studied at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur and led encounter groups, hung out with many great jazz musicians including Dizzy Gillespie before returning to San Antonio for the remaining fifty years of her life. There she became involved again with Texas politics, living on "Maverick Hill" in a streetcar her father bought in 1933. Terrellita was in the education field for 20 years and always a teacher, she produced a public access television program, and became an award-winning Toastmaster. She was also a world traveler spanning three continents: North Africa, Europe, and Asia.

Terrellita, in the words of many, was one-of-a-kind: a true Maverick! She was a treasure to her family and many friends.

She was preceded in death by her parents, her brother, Maury Maverick Jr., and his wife, Julia.

She is survived by her children, Fontaine Maverick, Lynn Maverick Denzer, Maury Maverick and wife Deborah Graham, and Sam Houston Clinton III. She is also survived by grandchildren, Gretchen Harms, Maury Harms, Joel Denzer, Elizabeth Blue and husband Ryan Blue, Graham Maverick and wife Brooke Linford, and Avery Maverick and partner Nyle Weldon, and great-grandchildren, Manny Prager and Ashton Denzer.

Memorial will be held later this year, please visit https://www.myfarewelling.com/memorial/terrellita--maverick-#events to stay updated.