Bath County KY ANNIVERSARY: 100th Birthday of Ruth Darnell Jones, 1938

From: WRFC71A@prodigy.com (MRS BEULAH A FRANKS)
Date: Sat,  7 Jun 1997

  Mrs. Ruth Darnall Jones, known affectionately known as "Aunt Ruthie" to hundreds of 
residents of Owingsville and Bath county, today was looking forward to her 101 birthday 
anniversary after "the finest birthday ever" on the occasion of her 100th birth anniversary 
Monday at the home of her daughter, Mrs. George W. Boyd, on East Main street. 
  While visitors from far and near came to join relatives in paying their respects to the 
county's oldest woman, Mrs. Jones rocked serenely in her chair, undisturbed by the hustle 
and bustle, and reminisced of the days of long ago when she was a child playing in the 
shadows of the wooded hills of Bath county.  She recalled, too, the day more than 80 years 
ago when she became the happy teen-age bride of Samuel T. Jones, who died 26 years later, 
in 1882.  Mrs. Jones recalled many happy occasions of the last century--the birth of the 
first of her five children, a trip to Florida for the winter in 1930 and other events of 
bygone days--but said none of them surpassed the joy of her 100th anniversary by the crowded 
fireside of her daughters home.
  Delving far back in her memory, Mrs. Jones Monday retold stories her mother related to her 
as a child about the days when warlike Indians roamed the forest of Kentucky.  She said she 
recalled [page crumbled; two sentences missing] standing guard with a rifle while the 
youngsters and womenfolk milked the cows and took care of other pioneer-farm chores.
  Despite her memories of the past, however, Mrs. Jones lives in the world of today.  Her 
eyesight is not what it once was and her hearing has failed in recent years, but she still 
retains an interest in the news of the day and looks no older than many women 20 years 
younger.  She keeps abreast of the news through articles read to her from The Lexington 
Leader, which she read regularly before her eyesight failed, and through radio news 
broadcasts. 
  Today, slightly tired by a busy day, she spent her time examining the hundreds of presents 
received Monday, and dreaming of her next birthday anniversary, and of the past.
  Mrs. Jones was the fourth child of Elliott and Sallie Conyers Darnell, and was born on 
White Oak creek, Bath county, Nov. 28, 1838. Married in 1856, she had five children.  Three 
of them are still living.  They are, Dr. I. W. Jones of Los Angeles, who had hoped to come 
home for his mother's anniversary, but was afraid of Kentucky's cold weather; Mrs. Boyd and 
John B. Jones of Bath county, both of whom spent Monday with her.  Her sole surviving 
sister, Mrs. Millia A. Gudgell of Bath county, was unable to visit her.
  Mrs. Jones' father came to Kentucky from Culpeper county, Virginia, and settled in Bourbon 
county.  Later, however, he moved to Bath county, where he spent the rest of his life.
  At the opening of the War Between the States, in which two of her brothers served, she and 
her husband moved to Bracken county, where they lived until the close of the war.  In 1865, 
they moved back to Bath county, where she has lived continuously since that time.  Her only 
trip outside the state was to visit her granddaughter, Mrs. J. H. Anderson, in Florida eight 
years ago.
  Mrs. Jones is a member of the Owingsville Christian church and attended services there 
last Mothers Day.  She had hoped to attend Sunday but cold weather kept her away.  The 
weather, however, did not prevent the pastor from dedicating the services to her. 
>From the Scrapbook of Annie Page Wiley.

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