Mary Waddell

Mary Waddell was born on a cotton farm in Lincoln County, North Carolina, during a time when the world was unraveling. The youngest daughter of Merton and Mabel Rhodes, she grew up with her twin sister Marie and nine other siblings in a home without electricity or running water. While the Great Depression and Dust Bowl shaped her early years, her strongest memories were of her father reading the Bible by lamplight each night and her mother baking biscuits and sweet “stickies” on the potbelly stove. The family later moved to town, settling in a white mill house in Lincolnton where they worked in the textile mills and eventually acquired their first radio.

Mary lived a quiet, unassuming life centered on faith and family. She married Reverend Jimmie Waddell, pastor of the Church of God in Ronda, North Carolina, and together they shared a deep love for Jesus, their church, and their extended family. Though they had no children of their own, Mary and Jimmie poured their affection into their 24 nieces and nephews. Mary was known for crocheting brightly colored baby dolls in vivid pinks, purples, and yellows for every little girl in her life. She required little in the way of material things, finding contentment in her relationship with the Lord and the people she loved.

Mary and her twin sister Marie remained especially close, celebrating their 93rd birthday together as the last surviving members of their original family. After Marie’s passing, Mary continued to cherish the memory of her husband Jimmie, who died in 2000, and the large family that had always surrounded her. She often prayed with simple sincerity, “I love you Lord Jesus, I love you with my whole heart.”

At the age of 95, on March 6, 2026, Mary slipped away peacefully after a time of prayer and singing the Doxology, as quiet and unassuming in death as she had been in life. She is remembered with love by the many lives she touched.