LifeNotes: Gospel’s Speer Family Member Passes

Mary Tom Speer Reid

Gospel Music Hall of Fame member Mary Tom Speer Reid died Tuesday in Nashville at age 89.

She was a member of the celebrated Speer Family, one of the most enduring groups in the history of Southern gospel music. The group was founded in Alabama in 1920 by her parents “Dad” George Thomas Speer (1891-1966) and “Mom” Lena Brock Speer (1900-1967). During the next decade, the Speer children gradually joined the group, including Mary Tom, her sister Rosa Nell and her brothers Brock and Ben.

The Speer Family moved to Lawrenceburg, Tenn., in 1929. Dad Speer joined that city’s James D. Vaughan Music Publishing company in 1934 and subsequently wrote or co-wrote more than 600 songs for the firm. The family traveled extensively throughout the South, selling Vaughan gospel songbooks from church to church.

By 1941, The Speer Family had its own daily radio show in Montgomery, Ala., on WSFA. Mary Tom Speer sang alto to her mother’s lead soprano vocal.

The Speers moved to Nashville in 1946 and began making records a year later. The group eventually recorded more than 60 albums, won 14 Dove Awards from the Gospel Music Association and was nominated for five Grammys.

Mary Tom left the group in 1954 when she married the Rev. Robert Reid. Following his death, she rejoined The Speer Family on a part-time basis beginning in 1969. By that time, Brock and Ben headed the group.

She also became the secretary for the Ben Speer Music publishing company and worked as a staff member of the Stamps-Baxter School of Music. In later years, Mary Tom Speer Reid became quite active in the Gaither Homecoming video series of the 1990s. The Speer Family retired in 1998.

The Speers were inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame in 1997 and into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame the following year. Mary Tom Speer Reid was a 2006 inductee into the Southern Gospel Hall of Fame.

She is survived by her sister Rosa Nell Speer Powell, brother Ben Speer, son Timothy Scott Reid, daughter Teri Reid Fontaine, daughter Cynthia Lee Reid, six grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

A gathering of family and friends will be on Friday, Sept. 19, from 4-8 p.m. at Woodlawn-Roesch-Patton Funeral Home at 660 Thompson Lane in Nashville.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the Stamps-Baxter Scholarship Fund, P.O. Box 40201, Nashville, TN 37204 or to the Altzheimer’s Association, 4825 Trousdale Dr., Nashville, TN 37220.