Marguerita Black Obituary

MARGUERITA "RITA" BLACK
November 29, 1969 January 4, 2021
Rita Black, 51, passed from this life on January 4, 2021. She was the daughter of Karoline and Jose Gonzalez.
Rita was born in Houston, Texas and raised in El Paso, Texas.
She enjoyed watching and learning football as a lifelong Green Bay Packers fan cultivated on her father's knee, Sundays eating a peanut butter (spread all the way to the edges) sandwich.
Rita reconnected with her biological mother, Mary Jane Steele and two sisters, Elizabeth and Erika as well as all her cousins, nieces and nephews in Michigan.
She received her Criminal Justice degree from the University of Texas at El Paso, go Miners!
Rita's career took off and she joined the United States Air Force as a Space Systems Operations Specialist. The Air Force brought her to the front range where she had the privilege of launching and maintaining many of our country's surveillance and GPS Satellites.
When Rita left the military she joined Lockheed Martin and ultimately CACI and became an accomplished proposal, test and project manager.
Her first marriage to Dennis McElhinney gave her her only son, Brendon McElhinney, the light and joy of her life. Family was always Rita's focus, and she loved her children of marriage, Dennis, Patrick and Kimberlin as much as her boy.
Rita married Wayne Black, the love of her life, in 2010. Rita was a loving mom to Brendon, Alex, Paige, Zachary, and Mackenzie. They all became a very close family, sharing Rita's love among them.
Rita was finally able to discover her hometown Houston family from her biological father Robert Chavez. This allowed her to share the love of her siblings, Danell, Aurora and Robert; along with innumerable cousins; nephews; nieces; and brother-in-law, Michael.
Rita's life was filled with the joys of helping others reach their goals, leading teams of coworkers to success, enjoying concerts with friends and neighbors, dancing till she couldn't stand, seeing her children graduate, and all the facets of life while having a shadow attempt to take her life. She refused to let cancer dictate how she was seen and how she loved others.
She is survived by her husband, Wayne Black; sons, Brendon McElhinney, Alex Black, and Zachary Black; daughters, Paige (Will) Goodman and Mackenzie (Peter) Hartmann; granddaughter, Luna Black; brother, Robert Chavez; and sisters, Danell Canas, Aurora Chavez, Elizabeth Guerrero and Erika Urbina; and biological mother, Mary Jane (Gary) Steele.
A private Funeral Service will be held at 3:00PM, Thursday, January 14, 2021.
The service will be streamed live. The link to watch the Funeral Service is on Rita's Tribute Wall on The Springs Funeral Services website: tsfs.co