Freddye Mae Scott's Obituary
Freddye Mae Scott
Sunrise: May 25th, 1926
Freddye Mae Scott was born in Dallas Texas on May 25th, 1926 to her parents Gertrude McNairy and Fred Walker. The fifth of six children, she now joins her brothers and sisters David, John, Ruth, Brother, and Portia who have gone on to their glory.
Freddye graduated from Booker T. Washington High School and learned stenography at a local business school in Dallas. Her family was very proud of her achievements. She went to work for the Department of State in Washington, DC in the late 1940s. While at the State Department she was assigned to work in Tokyo in support of Japan’s war trials in 1946. Freddye enjoyed working and living in Japan and during her later life would describe the climate of post-war Japan and the peace she found there as ‘not like Dallas’. She met and married George Harris Scott, an Army specialist and her first son, Russell, was born in Tokyo in 1949. The family remained in Japan for about three years and returned to Dallas for the birth of her daughter, Cheryl, in 1952. They moved to Oakland, CA, where she had her third child Jay, whom some of you know as Ronnie, in 1957.
Freddye became both mother and father to her children while in California. She was skilled at thinking outside the box even before there was a box. She prioritized her children’s education as she supported all of them through private school. She made sure they lived in safe communities and knew who to rely on while she worked. She instilled values of hard work and resilience borne of human limitations. She passed down exceptional planning and management skills that have serve her children and grandchildren well in securing life’s opportunities.
Freddye worked for the Oakland Police Department as a dispatcher for several years before moving to Berkeley in the early 1960s. She worked briefly for the University of California Berkeley as an administrator in the Microbiology Department. From there she went to the City of Berkeley and eventually to the Berkeley City Manager’s Office where she ended her administrative career in 1990.
Freddye enjoyed swimming, walking, the Santa Cruz beach and boardwalk, and cherished traveling. When home, gardening was her passion and her pristine back yards produced vegetables and beautiful flowers in abundance. She loved to read and hosted several book clubs in Berkeley. She tutored English as a Second Language to immigrant students living in Berkeley, during her retirement.
Freddye absolutely loved writing and imparted this love to all her children. She built a treasure trove of handwritten notes and letters gifted to her children throughout their lives, sent while they were away at summer camps, jobs, schools, and living elsewhere.
We will all miss Freddye’s humor, strength, kindness, responsibility, selflessness, and great mothering, even as we are soothed by her finally realizing a well-deserved peace.
She leaves behind her children, Russell, Cheryl, and Jay, and their spouses Gabi, Steve, and Darlene; a plethora of grandchildren and several great grandchildren, cousins, nieces and nephews; and many family members residing in Texas.
Sunset: June 30th, 2019
What’s your fondest memory of Freddye?
What’s a lesson you learned from Freddye?
Share a story where Freddye's kindness touched your heart.
Describe a day with Freddye you’ll never forget.
How did Freddye make you smile?