Obit – Mrs. Joy Dillehay Wright
Mrs. Joy Dillehay Wright age 94 of the Rome Community was pronounced deceased at the Lebanon Highway home of her daughter and son-in-law, Petey and Hugh Glover Jr., at 12:49 p.m. Sunday afternoon July 16, 2023 by Gentiva Hospice of Cookeville.
Mrs. Wright was at the Carthage Chapel of Sanderson Funeral Home where her services were conducted at 11 a.m. Wednesday morning July 19th with her longtime minister Stan Stevenson officiating assisted by her nephew Jody Pritchett. Hudson Montgomery delivered the eulogy and burial followed beside her husband in the Garden of Gethsemane at the Smith County Memorial Gardens.
Mrs. Wright was the older of two children of the late Arlis Jackson “Shoate” Dillehay who died May 16, 1965 at the age of 63 and Amy Ruth Powell Dillehay who died January 4, 2006 at the age of 97.
Mrs. Wright was born Melba Joy Dillehay in the Defeated Creek Community on February 28, 1929.
Her only sibling, a brother Jack Powell Dillehay, preceded her in death at the age of 77 on December 26, 2008.
In Franklin, Kentucky on March 24, 1945, she was united in marriage to Lock Seven Community native, Lillard Dewitt Wright who died June 18, 2011 at the age of 84 and together they reared eight children on the family dairy farm on Walter Morris Road in the Rome Community.
Also preceding Mrs. Wright in death was a daughter, Sherry Lynn Wright Pritchett who died at the age of 67 on February 26, 2020 and two sons, Lillard Dewitt Wright Jr. who died May 10, 2010 at the age of 51 and Ira Mark Wright who died September 8, 2021 at the age of 61.
Other family members preceding Mrs. Wright in death were daughters-in-law, Robert’s wife, Judy Wright, who died at the age of 48 on May 11, 2004 and Paul’s wife, Kathy Winfree Wright, who died at the age of 68 on June 18, 2022; sons-in-law, Jackie Doran Pritchett who died April 4, 2021 at the age of 71, Janie’s husband, Samuel Raymond “Sammie” Ellenburg, who died on September 12, 2022 at the age of 75.
Mrs. Wright was a member of the Rome Church of Christ.
She was the bookkeeper for the dairy and tobacco farming operation and after selling the family farm she constructed a new home on Big Springs Road in the Tuckers Cross Roads Community and for nineteen years was employed with the Wal-Mart Corporation store in Lebanon.
Surviving are five of her eight children, Paul Wright of the Hiwassee Community, Janie Wright Ellenburg , Robert Wright Sr., Myra “Petey” Wright Glover and husband Hugh Glover Jr. all of the Rome Community, Keith Wright and wife Jennifer Gregory Wright of the Elmwood Community; care giver and special friend Carrie Harper.
The Wright family requests memorials to the Rome Church of Christ.
SANDERSON of CARTHAGE
