Geneva Porter Bounds, 97, of Franklin passed away Friday, Dec. 26, at the Isle of Watercrest in Bryan. Services are scheduled for 2:30 p.m. Monday at the First Baptist Church of Franklin, followed by burial at Franklin Cemetery. Visitation will take place from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. today at McCauley Funeral Home in Franklin.

Geneva was born in Caldwell on June 26, 1917—the same day the first American infantry troops arrived in France during World War I. Her mother, Genevieve Holden Porter, was a telephone operator, and her father, Albert Duncan Porter Sr., was a grocer. She had fond memories of her girlhood, telling stories of sneaking out with girlfriends during sleepovers to buy ice cream, rolling up the rugs for dances in her house when her staunch Baptist father wasn't around, and crawfishing with her siblings (they fished while she worked on her needlepoint).

After graduating from Caldwell High School at the age of 16, she took her first clerical government job, which rotated her to different offices around the area. It was during a stint in Bellville that she met E.B. "Gene" Bounds, who teased her about her sunburn. They married on May 28, 1938, living in the West Texas town of Ralls before settling in Franklin in 1942.

Gene and Geneva's marriage was a true partnership: For more than three decades, he taught and mentored boys as a vocational agriculture teacher at Franklin High School, while she nurtured the kind of home environment that enabled him to succeed in his mission. She accompanied Gene and his students to FFA events across the state and opened her home to these same boys who would descend like locusts, gobbling up any food she might have prepared. In bad weather, their house offered a soft pillow and a warm bed for boys who lived in hard-to-get-to rural areas. And for those who didn't have much of a family to go home to, it provided a safe haven, a filling meal, and lots of love. Nothing brought her as much happiness as the noise made by a gaggle of boys treating her home as if it were their own.

Years later, Geneva would be approached by her husband's former students who said Gene was the reason they went to college. While Geneva might not have been the one to actually enroll these boys at Texas A&M, the credit for getting them there was owed in equal part to her.

After Gene died in 1973, Geneva never even considered dating again. He was truly the love of her life.

For 33 years, Geneva was a fixture at the Robertson County Courthouse, helping the county's agriculture producers through her role as a Department of Agriculture clerk. She was an active member of the First Baptist Church of Franklin and of the Order of the Eastern Star, sharing her Christian faith by the way she lived her life. She cherished long summer visits by her sister's kids, Genevieve and Joey, who considered her a second mother, as did the daughters of close Franklin friends. She loved her husband's family as much as her own, never differentiating between the two.

Most of all, she loved her son, John Duncan, and spoiled him with all the effort she could muster. After Gene died, she was either on the road to Houston to visit her mother or to Dallas to visit John and his clan. Family and faith meant everything to Geneva. Her legacy lies in the many lives she touched.

Geneva was preceded in death by her parents; her husband; her brothers and their wives, A.D. Jr. and Lauree Porter and T.E. and Lorraine Porter; a brother-in-law, Joe Anderson; her husband's sisters, Laverne Plybon, Johnnie Brown and Mary Jean Edmonds, and their spouses; and a nephew, Melvin Porter.

She is survived by her son and his wife, John Duncan and Elaine Bounds of College Station; her sister and best friend, Mary Nan Anderson of Spring; a granddaughter and her husband, Kara and Jay Socol of Bryan; a grandson, Collin Eugene Bounds of Vancouver, Wash.; a great-grandson, John Grant Socol of Bryan; and numerous nieces, nephews and "adopted" kids.

Memorials may be made to the First Baptist Church of Franklin, P.O. Box 365, Franklin, Texas, 77856; the Franklin Chapter No. 311 OES Scholarship Fund, P.O. Box 125, Franklin, Texas, 77856; or the Franklin High School Scholarship Fund, P.O. Box 936, Franklin, Texas, 77856.