Peggy O'Neal Dew

March 06, 1924 - December 16, 2011

Peggy O’Neal Dew went to be with her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ on the evening of December 16, 2011. She was receiving hospice care in the home of her daughter, Linda Folmar, in West Melbourne, Florida.

Peggy was the last of four children born to Albert Jackson O’Neal and Myrtle Hestor Maynor on March 6, 1924 near Beckley, West Virginia. She graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in Beckley, West Virginia. At the age of 18 she traveled alone by train to Albuquerque, New Mexico to marry Homer Dew on October 3, 1942. Homer was also from Beckley, WV, and a captain in the U.S. Army Air Corps. Homer was an instructor teaching navigation and bombing, and together they moved from air base to air base throughout the western U.S. for the duration of World War II.

After the war was over, Peggy and Homer returned home to West Virginia and owned and operated various businesses, including the King Coal Hotel in Rainelle, WV and the Southern Camp Inn in Dublin, VA, and Dairy Queens in Charlottesville and Richmond VA. Homer earned a BSEE degree from the University of Virginia in Charlottesville while he and Peggy ran a Dairy Queen and raised three children. In 1963, the Dew family moved to Huntsville, Alabama where Homer worked on numerous space programs, retiring from NASA in Titusville, FL in 1981. They were true devoted partners in all their endeavors, and their 60 years of marriage were never dull.

When Homer passed away in 2003, Peggy relocated to West Melbourne, FL to be near family. She was preceded in death by daughter Donna Dew Julias Dawson, and is survived by son Stephen and wife Janet of Wytheville, Virginia and daughter Linda Dew Folmar and husband Jerome of West Melbourne, FL. She also is survived by grandchildren Dawn Maynard and Stephen Julias of Reston, Virginia, Jennifer Folmar Arnold and husband David of Gainesville, FL and Scott Folmar and wife Pamela of Winter Springs, FL, and by great- grandchildren children Connor Maynard of Reston, Virginia and Nathan and Mitchell Arnold of Gainesville, FL, and beloved nieces and nephews.

Peggy O’Neal Dew was a true Irish lass, with a twinkle in her eyes and a story on her lips. She was out-going like her daddy and never met a stranger. Her steadfast and abiding faith, sense of humor, zest for life, and sweet and loving nature are her legacy to all who knew her. Peggy was one of a kind! Oh, how she’ll be missed!

Arrangements entrusted to South Brevard Funeral Home, 1001 S. Hickory Street, Melbourne, FL (321) 724-2222.

Funeral Information

A memorial service will be planned at a later date.