Pat Stone has stood on the same Lewisville, Texas corner before sunrise for nearly 60 years, waving cars to a stop so kids can cross. In 2024, the city gave that crosswalk her name.

A Job She Invented Herself

Stone did not apply to be a crossing guard. In the 1960s, she was a Girl Scout leader worried about kids crossing the street near school, so she took her concerns straight to the Lewisville police chief.

He brushed her off. So she went around him and called the Texas Highway Patrol instead.

A state trooper met with her and taught her and a group of other women how to make stop signs and hold back traffic by hand. Lewisville got its first crossing guard because nobody told her no twice.

Before Dawn, Every School Day

For decades, Stone has arrived at South Ridge Elementary between 4:30 and 5 a.m., long before the building opens, then returned again for afternoon dismissal around 2 p.m.

Weather has never been a reason to stay home. "If the kids go to school, I can go to work," she said. "I got a rain coat and a hood and galoshes and boots."

She is not shy about parents who block her crosswalk either. "I don't use bad language," she said, "but I do tell them to stop."

"I'm just hardheaded," Stone said of her decades on the job. "When I wanted it done, I wanted it done."

Lewisville Names Her a Street

By 2023, neighbors wanted to do more than thank her. That May, residents proclaimed May 1 "Ms. Pat Stone Crossing Guard Appreciation Day" in her honor.

Then resident Elle Rivera floated a bigger idea: name the crosswalk itself after "Miss Pat," as the neighborhood calls her. Mayoral candidate Winston Edmondson picked up the cause.

City policy generally blocks naming things after people who are still living. Edmondson organized a "People's Proclamation," rallying enough community support to push the honor through anyway.

In February 2024, as Stone approached her 90th birthday, the crosswalk outside South Ridge Elementary carried her name.

Still Her Corner

At last report, Stone was still walking that beat before dawn at 89, six decades after a police chief told her no. The crosswalk still carries her name, and Lewisville kids still cross it every school day.

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