Romberg

Sylvia Sue Strickland Romberg departed this earth peacefully on Sept. 14, 2021.

From her early teen-age years, she chose to be known as Suzy, and that is how most of us knew her.

Suzy was born on June 23, 1934, in the ghost town of Gulf, Texas, now known as Old Gulf, in Matagorda County. At the time Suzy was born, the hospital was the only operating building in Old Gulf.

The Strickland family lived in Bay City until about 1945, when they moved to West University, a Houston suburb. Suzy attended West University Elementary School, then junior high and then Lamar High School. The family of her future husband, Frederick Arnold Romberg, moved to West University in 1951. Their house was half a block from the Strickland’s. Suzy’s mother Sylvia Boney Strickland, and Arnold’s mother, Marcia Todd Romberg, had known each other when they were in high school together in Houston. Arnold’s sister, Lucia, and Suzy, then a senior, both went to Lamar High School the next fall. They carpooled to school during that school year. Arnold went away to college that fall without ever having met Suzy.

The next summer, 1952, on a weekend when he was at loose ends, Arnold’s mother suggested that he should go down to the end of the block and meet Suzy. After he knocked on her door, her brother Mike told Suzy that Lucia’s brother wanted to see her. Suzy’s immediate response was “I don’t want to see that jerk. I’ve been hearing about him in carpool from his sister for nine months!” Suzy’s mother and aunt reminded her to mind her manners. She did. A week later she accepted his invitation for a date. She wouldn’t let him kiss her goodnight on that first date, but she did on the next one.

Suzy attended Hollins College, in Roanoke, Virginia, for her freshman year. At Thanksgiving that year, she visited her aunt and uncle in New York state. Arnold traveled there to have several dates with her. Many years later she enjoyed telling that he had told her that she was going to marry him, but that irritated her because she was only a college freshman and a long way from thoughts about marriage. At the end of that school year she transferred to TCU. She received her degree in journalism from TCU in December, 1955. From fall, 1952, to summer, 1955, Suzy and Arnold dated as often as they could. They became engaged in the summer of 1954, and were married on February 11, 1956, at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Houston. Suzy worked for five months for an advertising firm, but left them as the birth of their first child approached.

John Marshall was born in December, 1956. In September, 1957, they moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. In June, 1958, they moved to Midland, Texas. They moved back to Houston in June, 1959, right after the birth of their second child, Alice Elizabeth, in Midland. Katherine King was born in Houston in 1961, and Laura Todd in 1964.

In 1965 they moved to Germany. Suzy and the four children spent the summer of 1967 in Bay City, living with her parents. Hugh Lawrence, the fifth child, was born there in July 1967. At the end of the summer the family went back to Germany. The next January, 1968, they moved to Brussels, Belgium. The family then moved back to Houston that summer.

In 1973 they moved to far north Dallas. The children entered the Richardson schools, and all five of them graduated from Richardson High School.

In 1979 Suzy and Arnold decided it was time to start looking for their last house. Her family was based in Houston and Bay City, and his in Austin, so central Texas was an attractive place to look. Arnold took a week’s vacation, and they got in touch with several real-estate agents between Houston and Austin. Initially they were looking for a country place, but after a few days they realized that they did not want to farm or ranch, so they switched to looking in small towns. Suzy noted that all the houses they looked at were like the houses they had grown up in, and therefore not very interesting. The last day of their trip, a Sunday, brought them to La Grange. The agent showed them a few houses in the morning, and they separated for lunch. They bought a copy of the Fayette County Record which had a photo of the Kruschel House (259 North Main), bult in 1907. It had been on the market for four years, ever since the last of the spinster Kruschel sisters had died. Getting back with the agent, they said they wanted to see that house. The agent tried to discourage them, saying that the house had been neglected and was a mess inside. Suzy said “If you won’t show it to us, someone else will!” so he arranged to get the key from the listing agent. When they pulled up in front of it, Suzy said, “Unless it is an absolute disaster inside, this is the place.” They went inside.

The wall paper was falling off the walls, the wiring was porcelain knob and tube, and the plumbing was largely lead pipe, but the house was large, airy (39 windows), and solid. Arnold had noticed an ad in the paper for an architect. He was in his office (on Sunday!) and agreed to come over and look at the house. When he walked in, he said, “I used to play in this house when I was a boy.” He further remarked that “if you are going to drive a nail in these walls you will have to drill a hole first.” His most telling comment was this: “There are two things you don’t have to worry about in this house. One is the wiring and the other is the plumbing --- because if you buy this house you are going to replace them every bit.” Driving back to Dallas, Suzy and Arnold decided to buy the house. From 1979 to 1994 they made many weekend trips and spent some summer weeks doing a complete renovation of the house, assisted by numerous relatives.

From 1983, Suzy and Arnold made a number of crosscountry trips, in a succession of three motor homes. They visited British Columbia, Quebec, Florida and California and a lot of places in between, including the homes of their children in Texas, Nebraska, and North Carolina.

In 1994, Arnold and Suzy moved to La Grange. It was the most successful move they ever made (after getting married). A couple of Sundays after the move, they decided to shop for a church home. They started at First Presbyterian. The welcome there was so warm they never considered any other church.

During the 1990s, Suzy became heavily involved in civic activities and volunteer work in La Grange, as she had previously in Dallas. Her friend Bob Field asked her to manage a large garage sale to raise money to fund the start-up of a resale shop called the Second Chance Emporium, to be run under the auspices of seven La Grange churches. When he first asked her to do this, she declined, but it didn’t take much arm-twisting to change her mind. The garage sale raised the money and collected the goods needed to get the resale shop started. Suzy then continued for a number of years to be the manager of the shop. In 2021 it is still very successful, providing much needed assistance to Fayette County and La Grange residents.

Suzy was a leader in the Fayette County Republican Party, from the time when Republicans (though not conservatives) were very much in the minority. She and Arnold worked for many years as volunteers in the gift shop at St. Mark’s Medical Center. She worked regularly as a volunteer on the staff of the Fayette Public Library.

At the same time, she and her husband continued to travel. In 2017 they spent three weeks in Stratford-on-Avon in England.

Suzy is survived by her husband, F. Arnold Romberg, her sister, Ann Sherrer, her brother and sister-in-law, Mike and Sandy Strickland, four of her five children: Marshall and wife Sue Romberg, Alice and husband John Wood, Kate and husband Larry Clarkson, and son Larry Romberg. Daughter Laura died in an automobile accident in 1982. Suzy is also survived by eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

Suzy led a long and happy life, and contributed much to the happiness of those around her.

Memorials in Suzy’s name may be given to St. Mark’s Memorial Hospital or Fayette Public library, both in La Grange.

A memorial service will be held at First Presbyterian Church in La Grange on Oct. 9 at 10 a.m.