Fentress Boone Waits

A memorial service for Fentress Claire Boone Waits (75) of Atlanta will be held on Saturday, November 16, at 2:00 PM in Cannon Chapel on the Emory University campus, followed by a reception in Brooks Commons. She died on November 9th after 28 years of treatment for metastatic breast cancer.

Survivors include her husband of 54 years, James L. Waits, a former dean of Emory’s Candler School of Theology; a daughter and son-in-law, Lauren Waits and Art Gambill, and their three grandchildren, Harper, Crispin, and Amelia Waits Gambill of Atlanta; a son and daughter-in-law, Jonathan Waits and Anita Akella of Dallas, Texas; a brother, Howard E. Boone, Jr. and sister-in-law, Diane Boone of Jackson, Miss.; two nieces, a nephew and their families.

Daughter of the late Howard Ellis and Idelle Clement Boone of Jackson, Miss., Ms. Waits received a bachelor's degree in English from Millsaps College in Jackson and a master's in Education from Peabody College in Nashville, now part of Vanderbilt University. She completed additional graduate study at Emory and Georgia State Universities and traveled extensively in Great Britain, Europe, and Africa with her family.

After marrying, Ms. Waits chose positions wherever her husband's career took the couple. She taught English at a high school in Chicago, and later was a part-time English instructor at DeKalb College North Campus, now Georgia Perimeter College, in Atlanta. She worked as an editor at the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech and, after moving to Pennsylvania, directed communications for the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh. Returning to Atlanta, she was a writer/editor with the American Cancer Society.

Ms. Waits was an active volunteer in her church and community. She served on the board of the League of Women Voters in DeKalb County and later in Pittsburgh. In the former she chaired the Legal Status of Women Committee, and after the Equal Rights Amendment passed Congress in 1972, she headed a DeKalb coalition of organizations lobbying (not yet successfully) for passage in Georgia. She supported Georgia's WIN List as well as other advocacy groups for women and girls in the United States and in the developing world.

Over the years she served on the boards of Glenn Memorial United Methodist Church, Druid Hills Civic Association, Olmsted Linear Park Alliance, Breakthru House, and Mary and Martha's Place. She worked as a court-appointed special advocate in the DeKalb County Juvenile Court and as a volunteer tutor at the Global Village Project and the International Community School, in Decatur. During her years of cancer treatment, she was an active participant in the support groups at St. Luke's Episcopal Church and the Winship Cancer Institute at Emory. Ms. Waits loved the English language; including reading, writing and editing; and was a devoted member of her women’s book group for more than 40 years.

Instead of flowers, the family suggests memorial gifts to any of the nonprofits Ms. Waits supported, including the scholarships in her name at Africa University in Zimbabwe. https://www.support-africauniversity.org