Ina Lea Bobbitt Seely
Personal
Gender: Female
Date of Birth: May 7, 1934
Date of Death: January 17, 2005
Birth Place: Canton, TX
Death Place: Houston, TX
Ina Lea Bobbitt Seely
Former teacher enlisted family to care for orphans in Russia
By CHRISTY A. ROBINSON Staff Writer
Ina Lea Bobbitt Seely didn’t stop teaching when she left the classroom in the late 1950s.
Her husband said her educating nature continued at home and with the Russian orphans she visited on mission trips.
“I finally learned to pay a lot of attention, because she really knew what she was talking about,” Charles Seely of Fort Worth said.
Mrs. Seely, 70, died Jan. 17 at a Houston hospital.
Her funeral was Jan. 21. A private burial was held at Greenwood Memorial Park in Fort Worth.
Mrs. Seely was born May 7, 1934, in Canton. She graduated from Rockwall High School and received her bachelor’s degree in education from the University of North Texas, where she was a member of Kappa Delta sorority.
She married Mr. Seely – her high school and college sweetheart – in 1955.
She taught fifth grade for one year at W.W. Bushman Elementary in Oak Cliff in the early 1950s.
Following her husband and his oil career, she then became a substitute teacher in Seminole, in West Texas. Later, she taught elementary school for one year in Edna, near the Gulf Coast, and in the El Paso school system from 1956 to 1958 before leaving the classroom to become a full-time mother.
After the family moved to Fort Worth in 1962, Mrs. Seely became involved in several organizations. She was a member of La Maison, the Woman’s Club of Fort Worth, the Lecture Foundation and the Fort Worth Garden Club, and she volunteered at her church, Broadway Baptist.
She was a founding member and past president of Spectrum and past president of the Petroleum Engineers’ Wives Club. In addition, she was a docent for 20 years at the Amon Carter Museum.
After twice visiting Russian orphanages with her church, she insisted the whole family go in 2003, Mr. Seely said.
Their daughter Lea Anne Seely of Fort Worth later spent a year working in the orphanages, and their son, Charles Wayne Seely Jr. of Fort Worth, adopted three Russian children.
“We doubled our grandchildren from three to six, real quicklike,” the elder Mr. Seely said. “The trip had many lasting effects on the family.”
In addition to her husband, daughter and son and the six grandchildren, Mrs. Seely is survived by another daughter, Sheri Seely Van Sickle of Yokum, Texas; and a sister, Elaine Peninger of College Station.
Published in The Dallas Morning News on January 30, 2005
