05/03/2001

By Joe Simnacher / The Dallas Morning News

Services for retired math teacher Lorene Kitto Covert will be at 11 a.m. Thursday at Jeter & Son Funeral Home, 4830 W. Illinois Ave. in Dallas.

Mrs. Covert, 94, died Monday of natural causes at her Dallas home.

She will be buried in Laurel Land Cemetery.

Mrs. Covert taught math at Kimball High School from 1959 to 1971.

"She was a fiery, peppery little person," said her daughter, Shirley Godbold of Pantego.

At the beginning of each semester, her daughter said, Mrs. Covert wrote on the chalkboard: "Without discipline there is no learning."

Mrs. Covert was passionate about music. She played the organ at church and played piano for silent movies to earn money for college.

Mrs. Covert took a year or two of music lessons as a child. "After that, her natural talent just took over," Mrs. Godbold said. "She could play anything she ever heard."

The daughter of a miner, Mrs. Covert was born in Joplin, Mo., and lived in Elko, Nev., before moving with her family to Commerce, Okla., where she grew up.

She earned her bachelor's degree at the University of Oklahoma in June 1930. She taught high school math and Spanish for two years before taking a hiatus to raise her family.

Mrs. Covert returned to work after her husband, Glenn Covert, died in 1952. She was a secretary at Memorial Christian Church, which is now defunct, Mrs. Godbold said.

Mrs. Covert reinstated her teaching credentials and returned to the classroom when Kimball opened in the fall of 1959. She taught geometry and algebra until 1971.

She was also co-sponsor of the Future Teachers of America at Kimball.

Mrs. Covert was a member of Rosemont Christian Church in Dallas.

In addition to her daughter, Mrs. Covert is survived by two other daughters, Linda Davis of Duncanville and Martha Ancona of Irving; a son, Gary Covert of Plano; 10 grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren.