of Mountain Home, AR

December 27, 1931 - December 30, 2015

Silvia Lorene (Atnip) Shackelford passed away peacefully in her sleep on Wednesday, 29 December 2015, just two days past her 84th birthday. She battled numerous illnesses for several months before finally finding peace and comfort in the arms of her Lord and Savior.
She was a remarkable woman, sister, mother, grandmother, and friend, who will be missed by all who knew and loved her.
Silvia was born on 27 December 1931 to Eva Mae Davis and Orley Eugene Atnip, in Silva, MO, the third of ten children.
After graduating from Marston High School, Marston MO, in 1951, Silvia was a true trail blazer, serving in the United States Air Force as one of the first ''Women in the Air Force'' (WAF), a program established allowing women to serve directly in the military. As an intelligence professional, she worked closely with cryptologic specialists during a volatile time in our nation's history.
In the 1970s, she worked as an executive assistant at the Mid-Continent Aircraft Corp. in Hayti, MO, a company that provided aerial application to farmers and ranchers in the United States and Canada while simultaneously serving as the President of the Caruthersville, MO, chapter of the Business and Professional Women's Club, an organization dedicated to the interests and advancement of working women.
For over 20 years, she worked as a devoted medical assistant to the now deceased Dr. Rocky Ming Joe in Greenville, MS and Mountain Home, AR.
Silvia was an avid writer and a published author of romantic short stories in a multitude of periodicals.
On 28 October 1978, Silvia married Roger L. Shackelford of Greenville, MS, and they carried on a 37 year long love affair that lasted until her death.
Silvia is predeceased in death by her sisters Marie Blackford, Ruby Schone and her brothers Robert and Chuck Atnip.
She is survived by her three heartbroken children; Michael Lee Holland (wife Mi Suk and their daughter Amy of Norfolk, VA); Deborah Holland Phillips (husband Stephen of Cordova, TN); and Stephen Eugene Holland, (wife Amanda and their son Zachary of Severn, MD). She taught us everything we needed to know except how to live without her.
She is also survived by her sisters Evelyn Coffey of Pleasanton, CA, Peggy Joyce Milliot of Haughton, LA, Betty Smith of N. Charleston, SC and her brothers Bob Atnip of Princeton, LA and Tom Atnip of Cameron Park, CA, cousins, and her dear friends including Evelyn Fitzpatrick of Mountain Home AR and Carmen Sheppard of Caruthersville, MO.
''God saw you getting tired, when a cure was not to be.
So He wrapped his arms around you, and whispered, "come to me."
You didn't deserve what you went through, so He gave you rest.
God's garden must be beautiful, He only takes the best
And when I saw you sleeping, so peaceful and free from pain
I could not wish you back, to suffer that again''
(Frances and Kathleen Coelho)
Funeral Services will be 2:00 p.m. Sunday, 3 January 2016, at Roller Funeral Home with Bobby Atnip and Pastor Hershel Conley, Jr. officiating. A visitation will be Sunday from 1:00 p.m. until service time at the funeral home. Interment will be in Baxter Memorial Gardens. Arrangements are by Roller Funeral Home. Visit our online guestbook at www.rollerfuneralhomes.com

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