Longtime Welsh educator Cora Mae Vital remembered for service to youth and community
Published 5:14 pm Friday, March 3, 2023
- The Rotary Club of Welsh dedicated two new picnic tables in honor of the late Cora Mae Vital, a longtime educator and pillar of the community. The club received a $2,500 grant to buy the picnic tables for Richmond Park as part of its Picnic Tables for Cora Mae community project. (Doris Maricle / American Press)
Two picnic tables in Richmond Park were dedicated Thursday to the late Cora Mae Vital, a longtime educator who was dedicated to serving her community and its youth.
The Rotary Club of Welsh received a $2,500 grant from the District 6200 Rotary to help buy the picnic tables for Richmond Park as part of its Picnic Tables for Cora Mae project, according to Club President Arlene Heinen.
The picnic tables will be located under the pavilion, which was dedicated to Vital in 2021.
“Cora Mae was a fellow Rotarian who worked hard to help our community, as well as communities in our parish,” Heinen said. “She did so much, not just for Welsh, but all over. She helped everybody.”
Vital, who died in 2017 at the age of 83, had touched many in the community with her friendship and dedicated service, especially to the youth.
“This is wonderful as a dedication to her, not only because she was born and raised here, but she did so much for the community,” Vital’s niece, Lynette Batiste of Riverdale, Ga. said. “This is a great way to honor her memory.”
The Rev. Nathan Stevens said Vital was a “jewel” to her community and thanked the Rotary Club for its vision to honor Vital and keeping her work alive.
“She is resting, but her deeds are following her,” Stevens said citing Revelation 14:13. “And I heard a voice from heaven say, “Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.’ “Yes,’ says the Spirit, ‘they will rest from their labor, but their deeds will follow them.”
Vital volunteered to work with many area youth programs and helped children in need.
She participated in many professional, civic and social organizations and received many certificates, honors and service awards.
She held memberships in the Rotary Club of Welsh, the Jeff Davis Retired Teachers Association, American Legion Ladies Auxiliary Unit 520, Welsh Museum, Jeff Davis Council on Aging and Red Hat Society.
She was president of the Jeff Davis Retired Teachers Association and the Killinger-Vital Scholarship Grant was named in her honor. She was named Welsh Rotarian of the Year in 2017.
