Zanetta G. McDaniel's Obituary
Zanetta Graham McDaniel went home to be with her parents and her beloved sister on December 20, 2023, after a brief illness.
Zanetta was born in Seminole, Oklahoma, on September 29, 1948, and moved to Longview when she was in first grade, where she lived for the rest of her life. She got to Texas as soon as she could as they say.
Zanetta attended Bramlette Elementary School, Forest Park Junior High, and graduated from Longview High School in 1966 where she met her husband, Richard Lee (Dick) McDaniel, Jr.
After graduating, Zanetta attended BMI Business School and then in 1968, married Dick in a ceremony at First Baptist Church of Longview. Dick and Zanetta soon moved to Austin, Texas, where Dick was attending The University of Texas at Austin. While in Austin, Zanetta worked as a secretary for Governor Preston Smith.
Zanetta moved briefly back to Longview after Dick entered the Army and was attending boot camp and Officers Candidate School. When Dick became a drill sergeant, she moved to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, to be with him. There, she kindly tailored new recruits’ uniforms for free when they didn’t have money to pay for a seamstress. She also helped Dick prepare for the trainings he led. She often joked that she could “Secure and Search” a prisoner if she needed to. Her family had no doubt that she could.
After Dick left the Army, the couple moved back to Longview for Dick to help run the family business, McDaniel’s Quality Body Works, and shortly thereafter, they welcomed their daughter Alicia. In the late 1980’s Dick decided to strike out on his own and start an autobody equipment distributorship aptly named “Zandi Supply”, a portmanteau of Zanetta and Dick’s names. It was a true partnership with Dick being the sales and services arm and Zanetta singlehandedly being the finance team.
However, Zanetta’s most treasured roles was that of a wife, mother, and grandmother. She never turned down an opportunity to be the classroom mother or volunteer whenever she was needed. She spent countless hours taking Alicia to dance, piano, clarinet, and twirling lessons and never missed a recital, performance, award ceremony, or football game when Alicia performed as a majorette, all the while keeping an immaculate home and cooking delicious meals for her family and friends.
Just as she loved being a wife and mother, she adored being “Gram” to her granddaughter, Olivia. She and Dick spent every summer taking Olivia on trips to the beach, amusement parks, zoos, and wherever Olivia wanted to go. And for the 13 years Olivia played soccer, Zanetta spent innumerable hours watching games in the rain, the heat, and the cold. Ironically, Zanetta was both a Longhorn Mom and an Aggie Grandma. She looked good in both burnt orange and maroon, but then again, she was simply beautiful and looked magnificent in anything she wore.
Zanetta will be welcomed to heaven by mother and father, Rosetta and Gilbert Graham, her beloved sister and best friend, Stormy Graham Moughon, her mother-in-law, Lamerle Modisette, and father-in-law, Richard McDaniel, Sr. Left to celebrate her life are her beloved husband of 56 years, Dick, their daughter Alicia, and husband Copie, of Pflugerville, Texas, and her granddaughter, Olivia Davis, of College Station, Texas. She will also be missed by her brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law, Pam and John Mayfield, Mark and Jamie McDaniel all of Longview, and Vicki and Bobby Evans of Katy, Texas, as well as many nieces, nephews and their children.
Zanetta loved flowers, so please don’t hesitate to send them, but if you are so inclined, please donate to Cure HHT (https://curehht.org) in her name.
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