Jack Knight Obituary

Jack Knight was born on October 17, 1936, in the Mimms Chapel community to sharecropper parents, J. Truman Knight and Lotha E. Knight. He passed from this life and into the presence of His Lord on December 14, 2025. He was 89 years old.

As a child, Jack moved back and forth between East Texas and the Houston area and lived much of the time with his grandparents. He started school in Tatum and graduated from Milby High School in Houston, before attending the University of Houston.

Jack’s granddad played an influential role in his childhood. Because his granddad was the custodian at FBC Tatum, Jack spent a lot of time around the church. Some of his favorite memories included helping his granddad ring the bell. According to Jack, his granddad was a guiding force in his early life.

Following high school, Jack began working in a machine shop and then went to work for GM as a skilled trade worker, where he retired in 1999. He traveled throughout Europe in oil well drilling mechanical services. His first overseas job took him to Austria, but he also worked in Holland and Scotland, as well as offshore in the North Sea, the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.

Outside of work, some of Jack’s proudest achievements came through nearly 60 years of work with the Masons and the Scottish Rite & Shrine. He joined the Masons in 1963 and the Scottish Rite in 1969.

Jack was a devoted follower of the Houston Fat Stock Show and he walked as many as 77 blocks to attend the show. He served as a Gold Page volunteer and later became a lifetime member of the Houston Livestock Show. 

Jack moved to Marshall, Texas in 1976 and became a member of the Arabian Knights horse drill team for the Shrine in Houston. In 1982 he helped move Harrison County into the scholarship program as a “Go Texan County” with the Houston Livestock Show. He donated a saddle to the Texas Livestock Show, which remains on display in the boardroom.

He was very proud of his volunteer work with the Livestock Show and with the Shrine Motor Patrol Association, where he served as secretary/treasurer from 1989-90, the International Association in 1996, and President in 2014. He also served as Master of Masonic Lodge 22 in 1988-89.

Of all his accomplishments, Jack’s most decisive moment occurred at Park Memorial Baptist Church on Wayside Drive in Houston, Texas when he came to saving Faith in Jesus Christ under the discipleship of Pastor James T. Draper.

Jack joined Central Baptist Church in Marshall, Texas in 1984, where his membership continued.

He was preceded in death by his father, J. Truman Knight; his mother, Lotha Cloud and husband, Roscoe and his brother, Robert Knight.

He is survived by his son, Timothy Dale Knight; daughter, Malynda Lambert and grandsons, John Lambert and Dale Lambert along with other family and friends.

Services will be held at 10:00 a.m., Friday, December 19, 2025, in the Chapel of Downs Funeral Home. Interment will follow at Tatum Cemetery in Tatum, Texas.

In lieu of flowers the family requests that donations be made in his honor to the Houston Livestock and Rodeo, Shriners or the Masonic Lodge.