Fort Worth’s Susan Nix, TCU and Colonial Country Club booster, dies after COVID battle
Susan Nix, a civic leader, TCU booster and fixture of Fort Worth’s business community, died Thursday night from complications related to COVID-19.
She was 72.
Nix was a powerhouse for TCU and the Colonial Country Club who could frequently be found volunteering on boards, pulling together fundraisers and connecting people. Her family said she was most known for knowing every one.
“She truly knew everyone in the room; it didn’t matter where we were. We could get off a plane in Florida and she would see someone she knew,” daughter Kendall Nix Walton said, adding that her mother greeted everyone as if they were her best friend. “It was a real example as a child to watch my mother treat people like that.”
Nix founded Susan Nix Consulting Group and was a mainstay of the Fort Worth community. She counted Mayor Betsy Price among her close friends. Her husband, Kent Nix, was a TCU and Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback.
Funeral arrangements are pending. She is survived by Kent, daughter Kendall Nix Walton, son Kory Nix and four grandchildren. Her daughter Krista Nix Utley died in 2011.
Price said Nix’s impact can be seen throughout the community and her dedicated volunteerism would be greatly missed.
“I am deeply saddened by the loss of Susan, as she was a dear friend of more than 40 years and a true champion for Fort Worth,” Price said. “You could feel the love and energy Susan had for Fort Worth in everything she did.”
Kent and son Kory both recalled how her reputation for knowing everyone led many to turn to her for advice or connections to jobs. As Kory Nix tells it, that included TCU football coach Gary Patterson, who sought Susan Nix’s counsel before applying to the head coaching position.
She was Ms. TCU in 1969.
Nix was “ever-present at TCU,” said John Denton, an associate athletics director who heads the Block T Association, formerly the Letterman’s Association. Denton said her death was a big loss for the school.
Nix was heavily involved in the association and the football team, primarily as a booster and fundraiser. Denton described her as a “one woman LinkedIn,” and a go-to resource for connecting people or putting together fundraising events.
“The Nix family is pretty much TCU royalty and she was the queen,” Denton said.
TCU Athletic Director Jeremiah Donati said Nix would be “dearly missed” by the TCU community.
“Susan was incredibly passionate about her family, her community and about TCU. Her love for all three were apparent every time you were with her,” he said. “Our heart breaks for the Nix family during this difficult time.”
Nix’s passion for TCU went beyond football, Kory Nix said. His mother frequently mentored out-of-state students who landed at TCU without family nearby.
“She would have kids over to the house for meals and to do their laundry and really kind of was the second mom to a ton of TCU students,” he said.
Nix’s family described her as a generous, friendly woman who constantly put others before herself and looked for new opportunities to serve the community.
“She loved people and the first thing she wanted to do when she met someone was make them laugh,” Kent Nix said, calling his wife “so generous.”
“When we went somewhere, to go to dinner or go to a party or go anywhere with people, she always had a gift in her hand,” he said.
Walton remembered her mother would keep $100 worth of $2 bills in her purse to pass out. Sometimes the bills were used for tips but other times Nix would give them to children and explain what made the bills unique.
“There was nothing in her hand that didn’t leave her hand,” Walton said. “She kept nothing for herself.”
She held many board positions in Fort Worth, including several positions with the Colonial Country Club’s PGA tournament: Chairwoman of Programs and Pairings 2000-2009, chairwoman for Interactive Marketing 2009-2019 and chairwoman Executive Women’s Day 2013-2020. She sat on TCU’s national alumni board from 1980 to 1998. She served on the executive council for the Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl from 2002 to 2020 and on the Goodyear Cotton Bowl board from 2014 to 2017, according to a biography her family provided.
This year she joined the American Heart Association board. In 2015, 2016, 2017, 2019 she was chairwoman of the association’s Easter Seals “Hats off to Mothers.”
She had been on the BBVA Bank advisory board since 2013.
“She was always running, always doing stuff,” Kory Nix said. “She never wanted to say no.”
This story was originally published November 27, 2020 at 6:48 PM.
