Ida Jean Cowan Braswell

Ida Jean Cowan Braswell, 91, of Morganton passed away after a lengthy fight with metastatic lung cancer, at peace with God and man, on Wednesday, November 4, 2020. She was born in Morganton October 24, 1929 to Cecil E. Cowan and Mary Loduska Anderson Cowan. As her father was from Bertie County, down toward the coast, and her mother from Madison County in the mountains, she said she bridged the best of both parts of North Carolina.

She was a gracious Southern lady known for wearing hats long after they were no longer fashionable. She set an elegant table where all felt welcomed in a relaxing atmosphere of good food and lingering conversation. She gave tirelessly to her family’s needs. Devoted to God and her church, she taught Sunday School and Bible for over 60 years. She took a serious interest in missions, wanting others to know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior and desiring Christians to be steeped in God’s word. She helped lead the Women’s Missionary Union at First Baptist Church of Morganton and for years was the WMU Association leader for the Catawba River Baptist Association. In this capacity she visited the Association’s many churches to train the WMUs in new materials. Those evenings she left home, right after supper to teach at yet another church, her husband called “her missionary journeys.”

As her children matured, she took a job at Drexel-Heritage to contribute to the family project of getting them through college without debt. Well-respected whether at work or church, she met all people as equals, neither groveling nor putting people down. She had clear-eyed integrity and honor mixed with mercy and kindness for the foibles of others. She considered each person’s life significant.

A woman of keen intelligence she was widely read. She enjoyed biographies, history, theology, and murder mysteries. She kept up with current events up to two weeks before she died, knowing that God is in all events large and small. In her death we acknowledge the horror of The Fall and the final enemy—Death. Yet in her passing we celebrate not only a life well-lived here, but the knowledge that she has passed into an eternity with Christ where every tear is wiped away.

She is survived by her son, Bruce Anderson Braswell of Columbia, SC, her daughter, Eugenie Braswell Fein of the home, her granddaughter Irina Hadassah Fein of the home, nieces Linda Cowan of Richmond, VA, Laurie Cowan Perry of San Antonio, Texas, and Jenn Wells of Evansville, Indiana and sister-in-law Marjorie Wells of Richmond, VA.

In addition to her parents she was preceded in death by her husband, Marvin O. Braswell, and son Gregory Cowan Braswell, her brother Cecil E. Cowan, Jr. and grandson Gordon Wolf Fein.

Graveside services will be held at 12 o’clock noon, Saturday, November 7, in Forest Hill Cemetery in Morganton, NC.

Family requests no flowers; please donate in her name to Samaritan's Purse or any Pro-LIfe organizations.

Sossoman Funeral Home and Crematory Center is assisting the family with the arrangements.