Lettie Anne McGraw Spivey, age 93, passed away Tuesday afternoon, 18 November 2025, after a short illness in Fort Worth, Texas.
Funeral services will be held at 11:00 A.M. Tuesday, December 16, 2025, in the Fuqua Bankston Funeral Home Chapel. Burial will follow in Woodlawn Memory Gardens. Fuqua Bankston Funeral Home of Ozark is in charge of arrangements. The family will receive friends from 10:00 until 11:00 A.M. Tuesday at the funeral home.
Anne was born to Robert Lee McGraw and Robbie Lynn Beck, on Tuesday morning, 7 June 1932, in Ozark, AL. At an early age at Ozark Baptist Church, she made her profession of faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, and she served him faithfully the rest of her life. In March 1944, her brother, Robert Lee McGraw, Jr., was born. In April 1947, she began dating James Travis ‘Track’ Spivey, an eighteen-year-old high-school dropout and National Guardsman from Echo. Four months later, they eloped and were married on Sunday evening, 3 August 1947, in Fort Gaines, GA. The school board allowed them to re-enroll in school, and they graduated from Dale County High School in May 1949. While Track was doing military training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, in 1950, Anne gave birth to their first son, James Travis (Jr). Two years later, Track enlisted as an active-duty supply specialist in the U.S. Army. During the next ten years, Anne served alongside him in Germany, Massachusetts, Maryland, and Alabama. In 1962, when they were stationed in New Orleans, Louisiana, Anne gave birth to their second son, John Timothy. While in New Orleans, Track also was ordained as a deacon of Bethany Baptist Church. Afterward, he and Anne served again in Germany, then in Georgia. When Track went to Vietnam (1967), the rest of the family returned to Ozark. In 1969, he retired as a Sergeant Major at Fort Rucker. During his twenty years of federal service, he and Anne actively engaged in the ministry of Baptist churches or military chapels wherever they lived.
In the Fall of 1967, Anne enrolled at Troy State University. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree (Summa cum laude) in 1972 and Master of Science degree in Counseling and Guidance in 1974. Three years later, she was licensed as a secondary school teacher in history and psychology. In 1978, she began her nineteen-year career as a licensed Alabama Social Worker in Dale County. Anne was widowed in January 1979, when Track died of cancer as a result of exposure to Agent Orange in Vietnam. Afterward, she also became a Licensed Professional Counselor (1986) and began her ministry as a Christian counselor in Dothan. She served in this capacity for thirty-two years: at First Baptist Church (1986-95) and Calvary Baptist Church (1996-2004); and in private practice on West Main Street (2004-18). This ministry touched innumerable people in several counties throughout the Wiregrass region of Southeast Alabama. During most of those years, she also led an adult Sunday School class at First Baptist Church, Dothan, where she faithfully researched Scripture and wrote and taught her own lessons.
Anne loved the Lord, His church, and her family. Whenever possible, she shared the message of eternal salvation in Christ and tried to help people build strong, healthy relationships on His foundation. Anne had an especially compassionate heart for the marginalized, down-trodden and poor. She was a firmly principled person, with a reputation for being strong-minded, independent, and resolute. The sources of that strength were her daily walk with the Lord, a consistent life of prayer, and staying grounded in His word. Her favorite hymn was ‘Sweet Hour of Prayer’, and her two guiding scriptural passages were John 3:16 and Ephesians 2:8-9.
Anne was preceded in death by her husband of thirty-one years, James T. Spivey, Sr; her parents, Robert and Robbie Lynn McGraw, and three infant siblings.
She is survived by two sons, Jim (wife Beverly), of Fort Worth, TX and John (wife Lesley), of Mobile, AL; two grandchildren, Jennifer Spivey, of Tacoma, WA and John Spivey, Jr., of Fort Worth, TX; and brother, Bob (spouse Ernie), of San Angelo, TX.
You may sign a guest register at www.fuquabankston.com
