San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
JUDITH (JUDY) BONDURANT SPENCER
July 8, 1934 - September 19, 2021
Life-long community stalwart Judith (Judy) Bondurant Spencer passed away peacefully in her home late evening Sunday September 19, surrounded by her family, her books, her art, her keepsakes and a beloved rescue dog Lilly.
With a career that spanned everything from professional theater to public education, she brought passion, enthusiasm and humor to any project or organization she spearheaded.
“She loved life. She loved this community. And if you were ever by her side in public you quickly realized how much this community loved her back,” according to her children Stuart and Martha.
Judy was a true daughter of San Antonio, with roots deep in the region’s civil society. Scholarship and education were embedded in her earliest memories. Her grandfather, Dr. William Walton Bondurant, Sr. founded both San Antonio Academy and Texas Military Institute (TMI), while her father Dr. William Bondurant, Jr. practiced medicine for generations of patients at the Nix Hospital. Her mother, Martha Nieminen Bondurant, married her father while finishing nursing school. Judy was born July 8, 1934.
Judy graduated from Alamo Heights High School in 1952 with honors, as well as being designated Homecoming Queen by her classmates. She went on to graduate with from Tulane University (Newcomb College) with a Bachelor of Arts in English and Theater, studying under the legendary Gladys Kurtz. She soon moved to New York City, working at #1 Wall Street by day, and acting in non-equity theater at night. She married Norman Spencer in 1963.
She would find herself back in San Antonio, a single mother of two, chairing various English, Speech, and Drama departments within the San Antonio Independent School District. Judy had an unwavering belief that “every student should have a positive experience on stage.” To drive home the point, she and her students at Rhodes Middle School consistently “wiped-out” the annual competition in the state-wide One Act Play contests in Austin. It was a not-so-secret source of great pride. Judy was also instrumental in creating the student led Guest speaker series consisting of role models from statewide and local politics, business and military.
For ten summers, she also directed the theater group the “Off Broadway Players” out of First Presbyterian Church in addition to securing a Masters in English from Incarnate Word College, focusing on Mexican American literature. She also worked a stint for the San Antonio Express News, being honored by the Junior League of San Antonio for promoting volunteerism through print and electronic media coverage. After retirement, Judy would spend eight years as Director of Christian Education at St. David’s Episcopal Church, San Antonio.
Her board memberships, fundraising, and volunteering on behalf of San Antonio institutions would continue throughout her life. These groups included the KLRN Community Advisory Board, Los Compadres de San Antonio Missions National Historic Park (now Mission Heritage), the San Antonio Conservation Society, Planned Parenthood of South Texas, San Antonio Teachers Council, Texas State Teachers Association, First Presbyterian Church, Victoria’s Court Child Care Center Auxiliary, the Bexar County Women’s Center, the American Diabetes Association, and Girl Scouts of America to name a few. She was also publicly outspoken in local media supporting efforts to protect the Edwards Underground Aquifer against planned overdevelopment.
Out of all she’d done in life, Judy still considered her greatest accomplishment to be rearing her two children. Her son N. Stuart Spencer III is an attorney and former Capitol Hill Chief of Staff in Washington, D.C. (Princeton Undergraduate, Tulane Law). Her daughter Martha O’Neill resides in Alamo Heights with her husband Sean O’Neill after earning her Masters in Communications from American University and leading development efforts in Washington, D.C. for the American Heart Association.
While her sense of accomplishment rested in raising her children, her purest joy later in life came from time with her grandchildren, Lilly and Spencer O’Neill both of San Antonio. Lilly is a senior at Auburn University and Spencer a junior at Baylor.
In a speech given soon after their births, she noted with humor “After scoffing at my friends for their emotional plunge into grandparenthood, I am just as mushy, mewling and cooing as the next.”
Health challenges would restrict her movement and community engagement in later years. A visit to her home, however, would still be a rich saturation in recent art from local artists, books from local authors, and of course political and community gossip. A local reporter interviewing Judy for a 2013 profile captured these conversations best: “Her anecdotes, always delightful and a bit risqué, were things that I would have to commit to memory rather than include in this story.”
Judy is survived by her children, N. Stuart Spencer III and Martha O’Neill (husband Sean); grandchildren, Martha Lilly O’Neill and Sean Spencer O’Neill; brothers, Dr. William Walton Bondurant (Cissy), Edward Vaughan Bondurant (Paula), and Charles Julius Bondurant (Elizabeth) as well as numerous beloved nieces, nephews, great-nieces great-nephews, and cousins.
MEMORIAL SERVICE
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2021
1:30 P.M.
FIRST PRESBYTERIAN
CHURCH
405 N. ALAMO STREET
Reverend Scott Simpson, officiating. For those unable to attend, a livestreaming link is available on Judy’s obituary at www.porterloring.com. In lieu of flowers and gifts, please consider donating to Mission Heritage Partners (formerly known as Los Compadres) and Planned Parenthood South Texas.