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When planning the final service for Susan Dykes Holmes, her family chose the biggest church in town, but it still was not big enough to hold all the mourners who came to celebrate the life of an extraordinary woman who broke icons yet never ventured from an unadulterated commitment to home and family.

Her family was her highest priority—forever her first love.  She was a product of rural America, yet she flourished in community progress initiatives and was a pacesetter in the business of the state house where she was a leader who found a way to get things done quietly and economically.  It was about the process, accenting common-sense government.  It was never about her.  She was an entrenched team player for her community and for the state of Georgia.

Ministers Dr. Corey Ingold and Dr. John Brown gave a good account of her walk on the right side of life and commitment to her faith, but the stars of this uplifting memorial service were her family.  That warranted unending encores of gratitude from a doting audience, which surely had Susan smiling from somewhere in The Great Beyond.  

This was the most definitive and graphic celebration of life that I have ever witnessed. There was not a hint of maudlin emotion encroaching on the entire service for which she would have sung hosannas. 

Eight of her grandchildren spoke, leaving those in attendance uplifted and emotionally fulfilled.  All were brief, clever, and insightful while underscoring reverence and respect.  None lost their composure; they did not let the ambient atmosphere lose traction, and blessed us with feelings of alleluia coursing through our consciences.

Her second son, Sam Holmes, an accomplished UGA graduate and a member of the state’s Board of Regents, delivered a eulogy that was laced with love, passion, humor, and feeling.  His script was sensitive, penetrating, sagacious, and cloaked in humility.  It was a love and laughter valedictory that reminded us of what family togetherness can achieve in our society.

Susan grew up on a farm.  Early on, she learned about household chores.  She knew what it was like to slop the hogs; plant, pick, and harvest.  She knew how to cook and sew.  Truth be known, she probably learned to drive a pickup truck before she did a sedan.  Before the pickup, it was a tractor.  

There was always versatility in her makeup and her background.  

She was a well-rounded advocate of “reading, writing and arithmetic,” one of the foundations in her life.

She enrolled at the University of Georgia at age 16, soon after she qualified for her driver’s license.  At Georgia, she was a serious student, which was to influence the most important person in her life, her husband-to-be, one Paul Holmes who grew up in the city on Atlanta’s North side and was a star on the gridiron.  Bulldog football was good and important, but the most compelling factor was obtaining a degree, she advised Paul when he came courting.

Paul played football in the declining days of Wallace Butts and the tenure of Johnny Griffith.  He was a member of the SEC championship team of 1959 that won the Orange Bowl of 1960.  Paul loves his alma mater with deep and abiding commitment and has a passionate “Hail Fellow Well Met” personality.

Always smiling and walking on the light side of life, Paul is the master of self-deprecation. If the joke were on him, he laughed the loudest. Humor has always made his day.

He and Susan were a great team.  They became statewide personalities.  They enjoyed resonating friendships from Rabun Gap to Attapulgus; from Tallapoosa to Tybee Light.  

All of Paul’s old friends from his days on campus were intrigued that Paul grew up in Atlanta’s Buckhead district, but marriage exposed him to driving a tractor and fishing with a cane pole. He took a job as head of the U. S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service.  His ways and means became ingrained in the state’s bountiful agri-business fabric.  He was highly regarded, owing to his gregarious communication style and integrity.

Farmers and agribusiness men knew they could rely on Paul to work to assist them in taking advantage of the benefits with which they were entitled. He spent time crisscrossing the state and showing up at Farm Bureau and ASCS functions, rodeos, and watermelon cuttings.

All the while, Susan was keeping the home fires burning, but also becoming the first woman mayor of Monticello, and in 2011, she became a member of the state House of Representatives, serving for a dozen years.

The patriotic Holmes duo was generously welcomed throughout the state’s 159 counties. The legacy they leave for their offspring is not just reserved for family.  It embraces their community, the state, and especially the University of Georgia.  Susan and Paul Holmes were and are “Great Americans.”  Selah!