Viola Ellen Herndon

Viola Ellen Powell Herndon was born at home in Couch, Missouri on December 23, 1934, to Ocal and Leta Powell.  She passed away on August 26, 2025 at the age of 90, at her home surrounded by her loving family.  Her family picked cotton every year, so she missed some school and attended several different schools.  She wasn’t allowed to go to high school, so she went to 8th grade two years.  Nevertheless, she was a whiz with numbers and read voraciously as long as her eyesight allowed.

She worked as a housekeeper in Thayer, MO after leaving home.  She later moved with her sister and brother-in-law, Grace and Harold Palmer, to New Mexico and worked as a waitress.  When Harold’s job brought him to Houston she got a job at Blankenship’s Rexall Drug Store where she met her future husband.  Jessie charmed her into going on a date and they were married on November 9, 1951 in Mountain Home, Arkansas.  They were together for the next 72 years until his death in 2023.

When the Korean War was in full conflict, Jessie was up for the draft but he enlisted in the Air Force before the Army induction.  Viola became a military wife, packing up and moving wherever Jessie was stationed.  They lived in Colorado, Louisiana, Morocco North Africa, and New Hampshire before finally coming back home to Houston.  They were the parents of five children: Kathye, Sharon, David, Tom, and Billy.

After returning from Air Force life, Viola began helping out on the family farm owned by her husband’s parents.  She learned to drive a tractor, run a rake and supervise a haying crew, all while raising five children, helping to care for Jessie’s ailing father, making a big garden with Jessie’s mother and canning everything they grew while Jessie worked in town.

When Jessie decided to go into business for himself in 1971, Viola was right there by his side.  They opened a TV & CB shop at Yukon, which expanded to include gas and groceries, tires, semi-truck servicing and then chainsaws and lawn equipment.  Viola did all the bookkeeping and customer service while Jessie ran the business.  They closed the Yukon store and tried to retire but customers kept bringing their broken equipment to their house.  They finally bought a few acres on Lilly Road and opened Herndon’s Sales & Service.  Once again, Jessie ran the business and Viola did the bookkeeping and took care of customers until they finally retired for good in 2009.

She was a loving and faithful wife, mother, and grandmother.  Viola was a member of Ozark Baptist Church and helped out in the children’s department.  She always served coffee with a smile and was known and loved by almost everyone who ever met her.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Jessie; her parents, Ocal and Leta Powell; her sisters, Goldie Davenport and Grace Palmer; her brothers, Joe, Clarence, Gib, and Claude Powell; brothers-in-law, Marvin Dawson, Harold Palmer, George Davenport, and Herbert Wenger; and sisters-in-law, Barbara Powell, Shirley (Herndon) Wenger and Violet (Davenport) Herndon.

Viola Herndon is survived by her daughters, Kathye Hyde of the home and Sharon (Scott) Boehme of Springfield, MO; sons David (JoAnne) Herndon and Billy (Kim) Herndon of Houston, MO, and son Tom (Marsha) Herndon of Savannah, GA; brother-in-law, Chester Herndon of Houston, MO, and sister-in-law, Shirley Torrey of Alton, MO; 11 grandchildren, 17 great-grandchildren, 6 great-great-grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews.