After a valiant battle over a period in excess of two years, Roger H. Thurmond, Jr., who was more widely known as Mickey Thurmond, died on June 12, 2011, at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston at the age of 76 years. A lifelong resident of Del Rio where he was born on July 11, 1934, he was a son of Judge Roger H. Thurmond and wife, Day Hamilton Thurmond. He is survived by his brother Judge George M. Thurmond and wife Jeanie Davis Thurmond, and by his three nieces; Carolyn Day Thurmond of Midland; Georganna Thurmond Gomillion and husband Frank Gomillion of Lockhart; and Sarah Gail Thurmond of Austin; and by his two grandnieces, Lilly Quinn Gomillion and Lilah Day Gomillion, of Lockhart.
Mickey was educated in the public schools of Del Rio, graduating from Del Rio High School in 1951. He then attended The Rice Institute (now Rice University) graduating in 1955, whereupon he entered the Texas University School of Law receiving his Jurisprudence Doctor degree in 1958. He was then elected to and served in the Texas House of Representatives for three consecutive two-year terms, at the completion of which he served on the staff of the Speaker of the House during the ensuing legislative.
Although a licensed lawyer and member of the State Bar of Texas, he did not engage in the practice of law, and instead chose a career of operating his family partnership ranch of R. M. Hamilton & Co. situated in Kinney County, until his retirement.
Mickey was also a patron of the Arts, enjoying a magnificent collection of Grand Opera recordings, and frequent trips to Houston, Santa Fe and San Francisco during their opera seasons. He enjoyed cooking wonderful dishes in his kitchen, particularly of those family recipes that had passed through generations of his ancestors. Family members and friends looked forward each year to their basket of bunuelos and canister of his "spicy gourmet trash" during the holiday season. Travel was on his activities schedule also.
The family thanks the respective doctors and staffs of Rio Bravo Cancer and Blood Clinic, the Emergency Rooms of Val Verde Memorial Hospital and M. D. Anderson Hospital for their care and treatments of Mickey, and for the care and attention the hospital staff at Station P12 of M. D. Anderson Hospital devoted to our Mickey.
Among his last instructions Mickey requested no formal service or memorial proceeding be held attendant his inurnment at Westlawn Cemetery, a request that should come as no surprise to those acquainted with him. The family honors this request and an inurnment at a private family gathering will be held. He also requested that any memorial donations in his memory be made to the donor's charity of choice.
Funeral arrangements with G. W. Cox Memorial Funeral Home, of Del Rio LTD, 114 Fletcher Drive, Del Rio, Texas. 78840 Ph: 830.775.2000