My mom - DeLana Hood (Nease)

My mother, DeLana Hood, maiden name Nease, was born January 3, 1954 in Roswell, New Mexico.  She said, “No, I am not an alien like everybody thinks since they assume aliens are from Roswell”.

Her mother and father divorced when she was three years old and her mother came to Commerce, Texas with her on a Greyhound bus and lived with her grandparents.  Her father was in the navy so she did not see him much.  Her mother married her stepfather, Roy Thomas, on July 5, 1958, one year later.  They bought a house on Dixie Street in Commerce and she lived in that house until she married in 1972.  Her mother did not work until she was in middle school and the only elementary school was three blocks from their house so every day her mother fixed lunch and she walked home for lunch.   My mom was an only child but had lots of cousins so there were always kids around her house.  She said she had lots of friends in the neighborhood.  They didn’t have much money but she always had everything she needed.  My mom was a good student, making A’s and a few B’s.

My mom said, “It seemed like I would always have a fish fry on Friday nights at my house.  My mother would drive all the way to Oklahoma to get the fresh fish.  We had a metal tub and we filled it with ice and put soft drinks in it.  My stepfather would string lights around the porch and bring my stereo outside for music”.  Lots of her cousins and friends enjoyed the fish fry.  In high school, she made cheerleader her senior year and really enjoyed cheering.  She was also in several clubs, i.e., Future Homemakers Of America, the Spanish Club and Choir.  She placed 11^th in her class out of a class of 94.  My mom met my dad her junior year in high school.  They married on June 2, 1972, after graduating high school.    Their first son, Brad, was born February 20, 1979, the same day as my grandma’s 51^st birthday.  They lived in Dallas, and in 1987 they moved to Rockwall, Texas.  Their second son, me, Jordan, was born April 8, 1988.   My mom and dad were married 22 years before divorcing in 1994. 

My moms only granddaughter, Hannah, was born July 15, 2005.  She is such a smart little girl.  My mom’s mother still has many relatives who live in the Commerce area.  The community of Horton, near Commerce, was named after my grandmothers father’s family.  My mom said, “I have seen the university in Commerce grow from being a state college, then to a university and now is associated with the A & M system.”