1851-1884
Adoniram Judson Jones
Husband/Father Kentucky KY
There is a non-traditional message on a tombstone in the Fairview Cemetery in Liberty, Missouri about 10 miles from my house. The stone is rather audacious and reads:
Judson Waldo Jones
Psychologist
Feb. 2, 1883-July 7, 1962
Son of
Adoniram Judson Jones
And
Mary Elizabeth Bryant
Gt. Gt. Grandson of
John Bryant
Soldier of the
American Revolution
Records reveal that Judson Waldo Jones was born in Columbia, KY, in 1883 and that he graduated of William Jewell College. His tombstone says he was a psychologist though his obituary describes him as a chemist.[1] In 1958 Judson Jones was living in a hospital managed by the International Order of Odd Fellows in Liberty, MO. By 1959 he was judged non compos mentis (NCM) or too “mentally incompetent because of age and illness senility to transact any business for himself”[2] and attorney John Pasley was assigned to act on behalf of Judson Jones.
Pasley fulfilled the wishes of his client and had the tombstone carved as Mr. Jones requested. Judson Waldo Jones was proud of his mother who was descended from a Revolutionary War soldier and had that fact boldly recorded on his tombstone. He was equally proud of his father who was named for missionary Adoniram Judson, Jr.
The father, Mr. Adoniram Judson Jones, was born in Columbia, Kentucky in 1851, the year after the missionary died at sea off the coast of Burma. Mr. Jones married Mary Bryant in 1877 and they had two children, Bertha Jones (1879-1883) and Judson Waldo Jones (1883-1962). Adoniram Judson Jones died in 1884 at age 33 when his son was only one year old. We had discovered nothing more about this Judson namesake other than he was a husband and a father.
Widow Mary Elizabeth Bryant Jones married William Kelsey in Clay County, MO, five years later when she was 31 years old. She moved to Liberty, MO, and resided at 824 W. Third Street. Her brother, Dr. J. W. Bryant came to visit in July 1907 and died of typhoid fever while stopped in Liberty. Mary Elizabeth Bryant Jones died in 1937 and is buried in Liberty, MO.
Attorney John Pasley finished his obligations on April 30, 1963, by sending the residue of Judson Waldo Jones’ estate, $6,430.97 to his son, Graham Starr Jones in White Plains, New York.
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[1] “Judson W. Jones,” Liberty Tribune, July 9, 1962, p. 2.
[2] Petition for Appointment of Guardian of the Person and Estate, Clay County, Missouri, Estate No. 3285, August 28, 1959.