Thelma Tardo O’Bryant passed through Heaven’s Gates on Sunday, November 26, 2017.
Visitation service for family and friends will be from 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. on Friday, December 1, 2017, at St. Bernard Memorial Funeral Home, 701 West Virtue St., in Chalmette, LA.
Funeral Service at 11 AM, followed by interment in the Garden of Memories Cemetery in Metairie, LA.
Thelma was born in Franklinton, LA. on July 10, 1927, the middle child of Dewitt and Minnie Graves.
The family moved to New Orleans during WW2, where Thelma met Salvador Tardo of Thibodaux, LA. They were married in 1949 until his death in 1983. They resided in Arabi, LA and had four children, Russell “Rusty” Tardo (Diane), Salvador “Tony” Tardo (Carmen), Brenda Joyce (who died shortly after her birth), and Karen “KK” Battaglia.
Thelma was a long-time instructor at the Moler Beauty College on Canal St. in New Orleans, and then a hairdresser with her husband Sal at his “Overpass Barber Shop” on Elysian Fields Ave, and then with her son, Tony at his “Tardo’s Hair Designs” salon on North Carrollton Ave. in New Orleans.
She was a kind and gentle lady, always gracious and hospitable, who loved her family and friends and her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and she was loved by all who knew her.
Sixteen years after being widowed, Thelma married her old childhood sweetheart, Fleet O’Bryant, Sr. of Denham Springs, LA. and resided there until his death on March 14, 2015.
Thelma and Salvador were longtime members of Elysian Fields Ave Baptist Church and Faithful Word Assembly. Fleet and Thelma attended Hebron Baptist Church in Denham Springs, and then after Fleet’s death she resided with Tony and Carmen in Chalmette and attended Gospel Temple
She was preceded in death by her parents, Dewitt and Minnie Graves, her brother Alton Graves, her two daughters, Brenda Joyce and Karen, her husband Salvador Tardo and by her second husband Fleet O’Bryant, Sr. and his daughter, Sylvia Darlene O’Bryant.
Thelma is survived by her sister Joyce Bradley in California; her two sons Rusty (Diane) Tardo and Tony (Carmen) Tardo; and by Fleet’s surviving children: Fleet Jr (Stephanie) O’Bryant, Linda (Kelvin) Cockerham, Sandra (Ronnie) Wesley, Gail Hall and William O’Bryant, and by many grandchildren, great-grandchildren, nieces and nephews.
“Absent from the body, present with the Lord.” –2 Corinthians 5:8
