Rebecca Mae Treat, age of 92, Branson, Missouri

Rebecca Mae Treat passed away Friday, March 3, 2023, at the home of her youngest daughter, at the age of 92. She was born May 31, 1930, in Marshall, Arkansas, to Blaine Thomas and Mary Elizabeth Myatt. Growing up, Rebecca was an All-State basketball player in high school, and she caught the eye of a young, fellow student, named  Alfred C. Treat.  Having watched her in various high school ball games, as a black-haired beauty, when Alfred moved to Marshall, the first person he saw at the top of the high school stairs was Rebecca, and that was it.  He followed her to class and sat down beside her, and they were together from that day on.  When asked why Rebecca chose Alfred, with that sly grin, she would always say, “He was the only one that had a truck!”  Rebecca went on to attend Arkansas Tech for a year, but her happiest story was her love story with Alfred, so they were married at the First Baptist Church in Marshall, Arkansas, on August 5, 1949, and lived as sweethearts for 69 years, until Alfred’s death in 2018, in Branson, Missouri. 

Over the course of their married life, Rebecca was a beautician, an Avon sales rep, a Sunday School teacher, and Women’s Missionary Union Director in her church, always having a heart for missions.  She and Alfred had three daughters, Alicia, Mary, and Kathy.  All three girls graduated from Baylor University, and since Alfred was a long-haul trucker and Teamster, when he had to be on the road driving to support his family, but never worried, as Rebecca always made a home for her family, with food on the table, making clothes for her girls, and supporting and attending all of their activities.  There was always love in the home, but the most important thing she did was to teach her girls about Jesus. 

But the story isn’t over without sharing what the Treat’s called their best years. During retirement, Alfred and Rebecca started another adventure, after contacting the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, when they became actively involved in volunteer mission work. Working in dozens of locations in many states, the Treats spent up to six months each year working on construction projects, youth and children’s work, cooking, hauling goods and people, feeding and clothing ministries, camps, and encouraging churches/people in struggling areas. The friendships and memories they made enriched their lives in ways they had never expected, and God blessed them with health to work twenty years past retirement.  In their later years, after they could no longer make their mission trips, Rebecca always loved watching football and basketball games with Alfred. 

Rebecca dearly loved her four granddaughters, Joely Glover, Kelly Dowden, Katie Pittman, and Mary Grace Eaton, and she adored her eight great-grandchildren. She taught her granddaughters how to cook and to sew, and gave them a surprise present each Christmas, filled with antiques she had collected throughout the year.  Giggles galore filled the room as they opened their special gifts, and that brought her so much joy.  Rebecca was well known for keeping beautiful flowers at their long-time home in Maud, Oklahoma, making tiny yo-yo quilts, and making beautiful personalized cards from dried flowers.  She sold enough of her dried-flower cards to give each granddaughter a graduation love gift.

Rebecca is survived by her sister, Kathryn Myatt, of Dallas, Texas, and two brothers, Daniel Myatt and his wife Clara Nell, of Hot Springs, Arkansas, and James Myatt and his wife, Sara, of Vilonia, Arkansas, as well as her three daughters, Alicia Watts and her husband, John, Mary Treat, and Kathy Grady, and her husband, Jim, as well as her four granddaughters, and eight great grandkids.  Granny Treat will be lovingly remembered and dearly missed!

Visitation will start at 10:00 A.M. at Snapp-Bearden Funeral Home, in Branson, Missouri, Monday, March 6, 2023, with services to immediately follow at 11:00 A.M. in the Snapp-Bearden Chapel, officiated by Rebecca’s Son-In-Law, John Watts.  Reverend Watts will also officiate the burial, which will immediately follow the service, at the Ozarks Memorial Park Cemetery, on the same property in Branson.  Arrangements are under the direction of Snapp-Bearden Funeral Home.

Snapp-Bearden Funeral Home and Crematory

1638 East State Highway 76

Branson, Missouri 65616

Telephone – 417-334-3670

Fax – 417-336-3670