August 29, 2011

Emily Hurff Cross Jones, 93, passed away peacefully on Aug. 29, 2011, at Mayo Clinic Jacksonville. She was the widow of the late Emerson Philip Jones Sr., of Franklin, Va.; they were married for more than 48 years. Mrs. Jones lived in Saint Augustine, Fla., for the last decade.

She was one of six children of the late Evelyn Hurff Cross and Marion Austin Cross Sr., of Suffolk, Va. Mrs. Jones graduated from Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, where she majored in chemistry and was a member of the May Court and Alpha Chi Omega. She later served as president of the Tidewater RMWC Alumnae Association. Mrs. Jones was named one of the “Most Beautiful College Girls of 1939” by Vogue Magazine, and one of the “Best Dressed Women in Virginia” by the Richmond Times-Dispatch on several occasions.

Reared in the Main Street Methodist Church in Suffolk, she taught Sunday school for more than 30 years in the Franklin Congregational Church.

In youth, she served the Norfolk Council of the Girl Scouts of America as a counselor at Lake Matoaka, and later as a troop leader in the Church of the Good Shepherd of Norfolk during World War II. In Franklin, Mrs. Jones became a den mother of the Boy Scouts of America.

She served on the executive boards of the Southampton Hospital Auxiliary and the Franklin Woman’s Club. Mrs. Jones was president of the Franklin Garden Club; her home in Franklin, “Lawnwood,” was featured in a Colonial Homes Tour sponsored by the parent Garden Club of Virginia.

An avid historian and genealogist, she was a member of the National Society of the Colonial Dames of America in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and of the Constantia chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. She was a past member and trustee of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.

Survivors include her two sons and their families: Milton Randolph Jones, his wife Georgia Graham Jones, and her grandson Randolph Graham Jones, all of Austin, Texas; and Dr. Emerson Philip Jones Jr., and her granddaughter, Ashleigh Caroline Jones, both of Greenwich, Conn. Mrs. Jones is also survived by two brothers: John Franklin Cross II, of Driver, Va., and Wilbur Rawles Cross of Winston-Salem, N.C.

Mrs. Jones was predeceased by her sister, Mary Evelyn Cross Hayes, by her brothers Marion Austin Cross Jr. and Joseph Milton Cross III, and by her daughter-in-law, Julia Falor Jones.

A memorial service was conducted at Glenmoor in Saint Augustine, with private interment to be held in her native Virginia. Donations in lieu of flowers may be made to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, or to the Mayo Clinic Jacksonville.