Mary Lou Lilly Wood

November 18, 1938 – October 18, 2025

Mary Lou Lilly Wood went to be with her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ on Saturday, October 18, 2025, with family by her side in Fredericksburg, Va.

“I never thought I’d live this long,” Mary Lou said when she turned 86 last November 18.

Mary Lou  came into the world nearly two months early at her paternal grandparents’ Mabscott, West Va., home in 1938, weighing 2 pounds, 3 ounces. The family story is that she was so tiny at birth that she was put in a dresser drawer and kept warm close to the coal stove. Mary Lou was a loving daughter of Alma (Pettry) and Add F. Lilly, as well as a devoted sister, wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother.

“Serene I fold my hands and wait,” was the yearbook inscription beside her 1957 senior photo for Shady Spring High School in Beaver, West Va., but anyone who knew Mary “Go” Lilly never doubted she had plenty of spunk. Three days after graduating, she married her beloved “sailor boy,” James Rawles Wood, after a 14-month courtship (mostly by letters) and left West Virginia for good. She managed a growing family on an enlisted man’s U.S. Navy salary at bases in South Carolina and Rhode Island. By the time the fourth child came along in 1963, the family was squeezed into a two-bedroom mobile home on the Wood homeplace in Goochland Va. Mary Lou took care of her family economically as well, working as a clerk-typist for the Virginia Division of Motor Vehicles in Richmond for several years before the family moved to a home in Henrico County. When her truck-driving husband, Jim, realized his dream in 1971 of fixing up an old home, Mary Lou held down the fort as the “Rustling W” in Louisa County was ripped down and rebuilt around her family. She also did office work at two factories in Louisa. When the children grew up and left home, Mary Lou briefly worked as a women’s prison guard in Goochland (she miraculously passed the shotgun shooting range test) and later held down a position at Home Beneficial Life Insurance in Richmond for a decade. She left that job to care for her husband, Jim, after he suffered serious injuries in a trucking accident in May 1991. The two shared nearly 60 years of marriage before Jim’s death on February 11, 2017. They were active together at Dogwood and South Anna Baptist churches and with American Legion Post 215 in Goochland and Post 116 in Louisa. Their daughter, Elizabeth Carol (Wood) Farmer of Fredericksburg, along with Carol’s husband, Don Farmer, helped make sure Mary Lou could stay in her home after Jim’s death. Carol cared for her daily during her final illness over the last several months.

Family members include her sons, James Mark Wood (Becky) of Cuckoo and Paul Wood (Mary) of Apple Grove; and her daughters, Elizabeth Carol Farmer (Don) of Fredericksburg and Sherry Wood (Jeff) of Rye, N.H.; her grandchildren, Brandon Farmer (Allie); Shane Farmer; Sarah Osorio (Brayand); Matthew Wood; Eliza (Edward) Wood; James Wood (Julia); John Wood (Jacqui); and Kristy Wood.

Mary Lou was blessed with nine great-grandchildren Landon and Sadie Farmer; Nathaniel and Eleanor Mosswood; and Alice, Carson, Amelia, Sawyer and Waylon Wood.

All four of her siblings survive Betty Carol Manning of Hampton, Va.; Warren Lilly of Glen Allen, Va.; Zora Schulke of Livonia, Mich.; and Tom Lilly (Billie)  of Mechanicsville, Va. Zora sat vigil with Mary Lou in her final week of life. Mary Lou was fond of her many nieces and nephews, who often spent summer weeks with the family while growing up. And she had cherished friendships with Katie Bowles, Margaret Mulawa and Bobbie Cassidy of Louisa.

The family will receive friends from 1-2 p.m. on Thursday, October 23, 2025 at Lacy Funeral Home 6241 Cross County Rd, Mineral, VA 23117.  A funeral service will be held at 2 p.m. Interment will follow in South Anna Baptist Church Cemetery.