Frieda Jo Schlemeyer Colfelt

TYLER — Born Frieda Jo Schlemeyer on May 27, 1935, she died from a heart condition on January 6, 2025, in her Tyler, Texas home while “standing up”, as was her wish and as her father and grandfather had died. There would be no mental decline, incapacity, or rest home for her. This proud, independent, Texan, German lady left us on her own terms at almost 90 years old, while talking on the telephone.

Her early years were spent in Overton, Texas during the oil boom, where she is now buried in sight of the windows of her third-grade classroom. Her father, Frederick Otto Schlemeyer, an immigrant from Emmerke, Germany, ran a machine shop in Overton until the end of World War II, when he retired and moved the family to a small farm in Azle, Texas, where she lived until attending the University of Texas at 16 years old. Her mother, born Florence A. Felix in Muskogee, Oklahoma, is buried next to her and is a direct descendant of Mary Royall Isham, the great-grandmother of Thomas Jefferson and a direct descendant of Charlemagne. Her grandmother Netti Poindexter Felix is the great aunt of Admiral John Poindexter, National Security Advisor under Ronald Reagan.

Frieda attended UT-Austin until she married Harry P. Anastopulos, MD at 18 years old on December 12, 1953, and moved to Galveston where he was attending UT medical school. They met two years prior while he was attending UT-Austin for a masters in microbiology. At the time, medical school graduates were required to serve in the military, and the couple chose the US Coast Guard due to its sole foreign station in Rhodes, Greece. Dr. Anastopulos served in the US Public Health Service and, starting in 1961, served as the chief medical officer of the USCGC Courier, which was deployed in Rhodes as an offshore radio broadcast station for the Voice of American during the Cold War from 1954 until 1964. She described their four years on Rhodes as the most happy and pleasant of her life. Before they were given foreign assignment, they were stationed in Norfolk, VA where their first two children were born, Peter (of San Francisco, CA) and Frederick (of Silver Spring, MD). While on foreign assignment, she gave birth to her third son in Tripoli, Libya, Africa, Maxwell (of San Diego, CA). They returned to the mainland in 1964, being stationed in Baltimore, Maryland, where Dr. Anastopulos headed the Radiology Department of Wyman Park Hospital, then left military service in 1970 for private medical practice at Greater Baltimore Medical Center. He died from a long illness on July 31, 1981.

At 46 years old, she could not sit idle, although she had the means to do so. In 1984, she attended the University of Maryland law school (having completed her college degree at Towson State University in 1972), served as a law clerk for a judge on the Maryland Court of Special Appeals, and worked as a litigator for the Social Security Administration until her retirement in 2001. She then moved back to Texas, as was her long-held desire. She and Dr. Anastopulos had always seriously considered moving back to Texas and acquired a farm in Henderson and a house on Lake Cherokee in Longview, Texas, instilling Texas pride in their children during many summers of the 1970s.

Prior to beginning law school, she met William Louis Colfelt of Baltimore, Maryland. The couple were very well suited to each other and were married on May 20, 1984. Bill understood that she would be busy with law school and legal practice during his retirement, but kindly accepted that burden as part of their joint lives. He later agreed to move to Tyler, even though his roots were in Baltimore for many generations. She was very happy in this second marriage and was close with his three children (Jenny, Bill, and Dave). They were blessed to have each other, and she was very pleased to remain known as Frieda Jo Schlemeyer Colfelt.

The roles of women changed significantly during her lifetime, and she possessed the flexibility and intelligence to enjoy the traditional roles and to take advantage of new opportunities as she adjusted to the ever-changing circumstances of her life. She was happy as a small-town Texas cowgirl on her horse Nelli, a wife and mother in a foreign country or a large US city, a traveling government litigator, or an independent single woman. She was a very fine southern cook, a voracious reader, and a supporter of the arts, including Baltimore’s Lyric Opera, Center Stage, and Walter’s Art Gallery. The societal changes occurring during her lifetime allowed her to experience and enjoy all of these roles and opportunities.

Her roots can be found in many parts of Texas, including Galveston where her grandfather, Sylvanus George Felix, lost his first family during the hurricane of 1900. His mother, Sarah Carter Felix, is buried in the Hillsboro Historic Cemetery. Her great-grandfather Frederick Simon Schlemeyer is buried in Electra. In Odessa, the Ector County airport is named after her brother Roy Schlemeyer, who was a WWI pilot and the first pilot of Braniff Airlines in 1925, which became American Airlines in 1930. (Although American Airlines prefers to claim Charles Lindbergh as its first pilot, due to his service with the predecessor Robertson’s Air Service in 1926, her brother was in fact the first pilot of American Airlines.) Her greatest shame was that she was born in Oklahoma City, although she claimed to have been conceived in Texas.

She is survived by five grandchildren (Harry, Mattie, Frieda, Katherine, and Sean), three children-in-law (Jim, Eileen, and Melanie), her step-children and step-grandchildren in the Colfelt family, and many cousins of the extended Schlemeyer, Poindexter, and Felix families.

She held a strong faith in God and was very pleased to be a parishioner of Christ Church, Episcopal (188 S Bois D’Arc, Tyler). A memorial will be held on Friday, February 21 at the church with services starting at 2 pm and a reception following in the church hall. Her family welcomes all who knew her to attend, pray for her, and celebrate her life.