Morris Aaaron Fry

Morris Aaaron Fry, 98, died Sept. 26, 2012. He was born on July 12, 1914, to William Johnston Fry and Ethyl Anderson Cox Fry and was the third of eight children. He had five brothers and two sisters.

He spent his boyhood years in Burnet, where he enjoyed hunting, fishing and roaming the land. He never lost his love for the Burnet area, and always thought of it as home.

He attended Abilene Christian College and the University of Texas, where he met Tillie Badu Moss from Llano. They married and both taught school until World War II. He was a true patriot and promptly enlisted in the Marine Corps.

He saw combat in several of the most bitter campaigns in the Pacific Theater of Operations, where he served with distinction. He rose to the rank of master sergeant and was awarded a Bronze Star for valor. While he was in the service, his son Morris A. “Mike” Fry Jr. was born.

After the war, he worked for the United States Geological Survey, and later returned to school earning a master’s degree. His wife died in February 1965. Soon afterward, he became a math professor at South Texas State University in San Marcos, which at the time was called Southwest Texas State University. He remained there until he retired in 1981.

In December 1965, he married Ella Virginia Greer of Marshall. After several years they bought a ranch near San Marcos, where they lived until 1996 when they moved back to his beloved Burnet.

They had been married for 40 years when she died in July 2005.

In 1966 the pair became close friends with one of his students, Janice Kelley Costa, a friendship that has lasted ever since. In 1994 the Frys asked her to be the daughter they never had and to be responsible for their well-being once they became elderly and needed help, which she has lovingly done.

In 2000 the couple moved to the Pafford Place, an assisted-living facility in Burnet, where he enjoyed living for the rest of his life. At Pafford Place, he was well liked, highly respected and was affectionally referred to as “Grandpa Fry.”

He was a faithful Christian and was a member of the Vanderveer Street Church of Christ. Above all, he loved God, his family, his county and his many friends.

Survivors include his sister, Peggy Fry Smith of Burnet; son Mike; daughter Janice; grandson Sean Kelley; granddaughter Tamara Kelley Griepp; six great-grandchildren; and many nieces and nephews.

A funeral service was Sept. 29 at the Vanderveer Street Church of Christ with burial in the family gravesite in the Llano City Cemetery.

Arrangements by Clements-Wilcox Funeral Home, 306 Texas 29 East in Burnet, (512) 756-2222.