Doris (Speed) Bollinger

Graveside Service for Doris Bollinger, 85, is 2:00 p.m. Tuesday, April 19, 2022 at Alvord Cemetery. Family will receive friends 12:30-1:30 p.m. before the service at Hawkins Funeral Home Chapel in Decatur.

Born August 11, 1936 in Fruitland (Montague County) Texas

Parents: William Alvin Speed and Pearl Whigham Speed.

Doris moved to Alvord in 1941, attended Alvord Public Schools, and graduated in 1954 from AHS.  She attended Mary Hardin Baylor College (now the University of Mary Hardin Baylor) in Belton, TX. She graduated in 1958 with Bachelor of Science in Home Economics Education with teaching certifications in home economics and elementary education.

Doris Speed began her career as a home economist at Texas Electric Service Company in Fort Worth in August of 1958, where she met Weldon Bollinger, whom she would marry on June 17, 1960.

She worked as a Real Estate Broker with Art Cooper Century 21 in Fort Worth, and obtained her real estate brokers license.

In 1983, she bought the Speed family home place in Alvord, and her life came full circle back to where she started.

Doris loved her hometown, which led her to serve on the City Council, and was elected

the first female mayor in Alvord’s history in the May, 1987 election.  While mayor, Chuck Wallace, owner and editor of the Alvord News, asked her to write a weekly column for the paper, and  “From the Mayor’s Desk,” was born.  In 2001, she again served on the Council and the EDC,  during which she first wrote the weekly column “From City Council Chambers” and later “Our Town” for the Alvord Gazette when the local paper was sold.

In August of 1989, she was hired at the men’s private prison facility in Bridgeport to teach basic adult education classes, and in 2006, was named Director of Education Programs. She held that position until her retirement in September of 2017.

Doris devoted 28 years of her life to public service, teaching and encouraging inmates to work toward getting a GED, so that they would have a chance to get a better job when they were released from prison.  When she took the job, she thought to herself that if she could make a positive difference in one inmate’s life each year she could feel she had accomplished something.

She was a devoted, and much beloved, wife, mother, aunt, and grandma, and friend, who always made a difference in anyone’s life she met. An extraordinary lady who would teach lessons of life and who definitely made a difference in her little part of the world.

She is Preceded in death by:

Husband Weldon, parents W.A. and Pearl Speed, Brother Lester, Sister Delois Akers and her husband Melvin Akers.

Survivors:

Her son, David Bollinger, and wife Karen of Grapevine, granddaughter Crystal Bollinger of Lewisville, niece Susan Akers Bills and husband Bob of Carrollton, nephews Bob Akers and wife of New Braunfels, grandnephews Ross and Regan Akers, grandniece Anne Bills, and Rodney, Rommie, James and Keith Bollinger and sister-in-law Rhomelle Bollinger all of Fort Worth, and a host of friends and former colleagues.

In lieu of flowers, please send a memorial donation to St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, American Cancer Society, Boys Town, or a charity of your choice.