Marybecca Tilotta Holbrook: Author, Teacher, and Church Leader (1922–2006)
By: Jimena Perry
Published: October 9, 2024
Updated: October 9, 2024
Marybecca “Becky” Tilotta Holbrook, author, editor, teacher, and Church of Christ worker, was born on May 3, 1922, in Nashville, Arkansas, to Carl Emerson and Anna Mae (Manwarring) Sullivan. The 1930 census recorded the family in Hardeman County, Texas, where her father was a farmer. In 1940 the family lived in Eastland County, Texas, on their own farm. Census information indicated that Marybecca attended local schools. She went to Abilene Christian College (present-day Abilene Christian University).
On December 13, 1941, Marybecca Sullivan married Santas “Sam” Tilotta in Houston. They had two children, George and Carol, and the 1950 census listed the family living in Houston, where Sam Tilotta worked as an auto painter in the auto body repair industry, and Marybecca was recorded as the owner of a photography business. Her husband died in 1955.
A devout Christian, Marybecca Tilotta was an active member of the Church of Christ. During the 1960s she was editor for a magazine called The Gleaner and published by the Church of Christ in Arlington and then Abilene, Texas, respectively. Under the name Becky Tilotta, she wrote several books about Christianity and life, including Give Them God’s Way in 1973 which was meant to “help you to be a more dedicated mother.” Other publications include Lib Movement God’s Way (original publication 1972; 1974), The Revised “Handful of Ideas” (1974), and Wait Girls (1975). She was also a founder of the conservative women’s political organization Women Who Want to be Women that fought against the Equal Rights Amendment.
On December 28, 1974, Marybecca Sullivan Tilotta married D. L. Holbrook in Hood County, Texas. Holbrook established Holbrook Publications in Nashville, Arkansas, and the couple lived in Hot Springs Village, Arkansas, by the mid-1970s. Marybecca Holbrook and her husband periodically taught as missionaries abroad and also collaborated on the book Wait Guys and Girls (1975), which covered topics surrounding sex and sexual standards for teenagers in regard to religious teaching. One of Marybecca Holbrook’s most recognized titles, Every Step of the Way, was published in 1979 and “speaks to young Christian women of the way of a Godly home.”
Beyond her work as a writer, Holbrook was also sought-after for her teaching and taught various Bible courses. For example, in Searcy, Arkansas, she taught at Harding College’s Bible Lectureship Forums in 1978. Her lecture targeted the women in attendance and was titled “Do You Really Know Him?” in reference to one’s relationship with God.
Marybecca Sullivan Tilotta Holbrook died at the age of eighty-four on October 19, 2006, in Pearland, Texas. She was survived by her children, two grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. Her husband preceded her in death in 1996. She was buried in Granbury Cemetery in Granbury, Texas.
Bibliography:
The Christian Chronicle, December 1, 2006. Harding College, Harding Bulletin August 1978 (vol. 54, no. 2) (https://scholarworks.harding.edu/hubulletins/410/), accessed August 20, 2024. Houston Chronicle, October 20, 2006.
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The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this entry.
Jimena Perry, “Holbrook, Marybecca Sullivan Tilotta [Becky],” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed March 09, 2026, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/holbrook-marybecca-sullivan-tilotta-becky.
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- October 9, 2024
- October 9, 2024
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