Her maternal great-grandfather had arrived in Tarrant County in 1845, and subsequent generations were raised on family land on Oak Grove Road, in present-day southeast Fort Worth.

Hazel's mother was a graduate of Fort Worth's Polytechnic College; her father worked for Axtell Windmill Supply and was known for his sense of humor.

Hazel and her older brother, Howard, grew up in a house at the corner of Lipscomb and Rosedale Streets in the area now known as the Near Southside; the family later moved to a home on Travis Avenue.

Hazel took a job writing classified ads at the San Francisco Chronicle under an assumed name so that her husband—and his employer—would not find out about her work.

When Grover eventually found out how she was spending her days and Hazel's newspaper career came to an abrupt halt, she joined the Daughters of the Confederacy and took an interest in the Columbia Park Boys' Club in the Mission District.

In 1931, Hazel joined St. Andrews Episcopal Church, although raised a Baptist, and took a public speaking course at Texas Christian University.

The club offered free medical care, eyeglasses, and clothing; after-school snacks were provided when boys began fainting from hunger.

In addition to such necessities, boys attended free movies at the New Isis Theatre, received music lessons, and were given lectures on first aid, good citizenship, and the Bible.

In 1959, she was appointed by governor Price Daniel to represent Texas at the White House Conference on Children and Youth and to serve a ten-year term on the State Committee for the Study of Juvenile Delinquency.

[10] She continued to serve on the organization's board until 1985 when the core group of women leading the club lost an internal power struggle.

[12][13] Among its notable alumni are professional football player and Texas House representative Yale Lary, pastor John Osteen, and Olympic shot putter Darrow Hooper.

She was invited to attend a dinner honoring John F. Kennedy in Austin on November 22, 1963, but he was assassinated in Dallas earlier that day.

The couple, who suffered a deeply unhappy marriage, lived with Hazel's parents for several years even though Grover had a successful career.

They never had any children and Grover died from head injuries caused by an accident at the Texas & Pacific Railway yards in 1943; he is buried at Shannon Rose Hill Cemetery in east Fort Worth.