Jasimine Fry Pace, 93, of Wichita Falls passed away on Saturday, May 22, 2021.

The daughter of Eva Adelia (Jackson) and Jep Fry, Jasimine was born on May 16, 1928, in Shannon, Texas, and grew up there during the Great Depression.  Her family were Clay County pioneers who came to the area in a covered wagon after journeying first from Tennessee and Kentucky to Denton County. As a child, Jasimine contracted polio. She recovered from it with grit and determination and did not let it stop her from pursuing her dreams.

When she was a teenager, her family moved to Jacksboro, where she graduated from high school in 1945. The family then moved to Denton, Texas, so that Jasimine could attend Texas State College for Women (now Texas Woman's University). In college, she majored in journalism and was the editor of The Lasso, the weekly university newspaper. She also edited and worked as a staff member on the Daedalion, the school yearbook.

After graduating in 1949, Jasimine stayed on for a period of time in the journalism office as the public relations assistant for the university. While in Denton, she met Thomas Pace, whom she married on Aug. 19, 1950, in the Little Chapel in the Woods on the university campus. They were married for 32 years before his passing in 1982.

Jasimine was also a former press correspondent before becoming a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse. She went on to teach journalism and English at Vernon High School from 1961 to 1990. She was proud to be the advisor for the Yamparika yearbook and the Roar, which was the campus newspaper. Under her direction, the yearbook twice received state honors. She appreciated young people and enjoyed working with them.

To know Jasimine was to know she was an avid gardener who relished growing beautiful flowers and visiting gardens throughout Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, and Arkansas. She especially enjoyed collecting and cultivating daylilies and was something of an expert on them. She was a member of the American Hemerocallis Society and through her flowering hobby she became acquainted with numerous experts in the daylily hybridizing business. Her other passions were reading and following the political scene as a registered Democrat. The culinary arts also fascinated Jasimine, and she loved cooking and watching the Food Channel, reading cookbooks always striving to learn something new.   She was the keeper of the family recipes teaching her daughter, Elizabeth how to can vegetables and fruits as well as make heritage meals passed down through the family.

Jasimine delighted in her only child, daughter Elizabeth, her best friend in life. Jasimine was always ready for a trip, to get out and go somewhere, and together with Elizabeth, countless jaunts were made to Dallas and to spots throughout the countryside. She had a taste for the big city and also for the quiet pleasures of the country. Wit and humor were integral parts of Jasimine's personality, and one of her best qualities was that she was a really good listener. When she went to live in a care center, Jasimine began to write her memoirs, and her vignettes paint vivid pictures of her experiences and opinions. She was a vital woman who was engaged in and loved life.

Along with her parents, Jasimine was preceded in death by her husband, Thomas Pace, and her son-in-law, William Kendrick McBroom.

She is survived by ­­­her loving daughter, Elizabeth Lena Pace McBroom, and several cousins and numerous friends as well as ­by former students who remember her fondly.

Graveside services will be at 1:00 p.m. on Thursday, May 27, at Lynn Creek Cemetery in Jack County. Arrangements are under the direction of Lunn's Colonial Funeral Home.

For those desiring, in lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to Lynn Creek Cemetery Association, the Literacy Council of Wichita Falls, the League of Women Voters, or any other organization of choice.