Nell Nixon was born July 9, 1916 in the mountains of western North Carolina. Nell Emiline Ramsey, daughter of George Thomas Ramsey, Sr. and Pearl F. McCoy Ramsey, was one of eight children. She attended a two room school house in Tellico, moved on to Franklin High School and finished at Central High School in Charlotte, NC.
She spent five of her growing up years in Charleston, SC. She has always had a flare for dancing and seemed to live life marching to a different drum beat. She traveled to New York City to try out with the “George White Scandals”, a long running string of Broadway revues modeled after the Ziegfeld Follies.
She came back south, met her husband Ed Nixon, married in 1941, and settled in Charlotte. During World War II, they moved to Fort Belvoir near Washington DC. She was working for the War Department, taking documents to the Pentagon, when the bomb dropped on Japan.
Years later, she was introduced to Brigadier General Paul Tibbetts, the pilot of the Enola Gay, which dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima. She and Ed spent some years raising their family in Philadelphia, Atlanta and Chicago. Moving back to Philadelphia, in 1961, they attended the Billy Graham Crusade.
It was there that they both came to know and follow Christ. This decision to surrender their hearts and lives to Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord changed their lives. They, together with other couples, started a coffeehouse ministry in Bryn Mawr, PA to reach out to hippies and college students of the 60s.
Then in Atlanta, they were asked to help start a ministry called Christian Care with an outreach to the inner-city poor of Atlanta. Both outreaches were team efforts. At age 80, she began traveling on international mission projects with son Boyd.
She made 8 trips to Western Russia, Siberia, Belarus and Ukraine where American adults would minister to Russian young people in schools, orphanages, hospitals and prisons. She did this both winter and summer. Then in 2006 she traveled to Israel.
Over the years, including very recently, they made numerous mission trips to Lancaster, PA, assembling humanitarian aid to help open doors for the Gospel overseas. She has had a heart for the Lord, a heart for people, a heart for ministry and a heart for missions. She is survived by her son Boyd Nixon, her daughter Sherry Wren and husband Billy, her grandson Christopher Wren and wife Laura Lee with great-granddaughter Libby, and grandson Matthew Wren and fiancé Melissa.
She died October 22, 2018 at age 102. She went home to be with the Lord. She is now with Jesus.
A Celebration of Life Memorial Service will be at North Avenue Presbyterian Church on Wednesday, November 7, at 11:00 am. Donations can be made to the missions department of North Avenue Presbyterian Church 607 Peachtree St NE Atlanta 30308. To express condolences, please sign our online guest book at www.
flaniganfuneralhome.com. Arrangements By: Junior E. Flanigan of Flanigan Funeral Home and Crematory, Buford, GA (770) 932-1133.
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