Jesola E. Jones, longtime city educator
Jesola E. Jones, whose career as a Baltimore public schools educator spanned nearly three decades, died of cancer Wednesday at Stella Maris Hospice in Timonium. She was 75.
Jesola Emma Ernest was the daughter of Jesse Ernest, a principal, and Zola Ernest, a teacher.
She was born in Wisner, La., and later moved with her family to Grambling, La. She was a 1958 graduate of Grambling High School and earned a degree in English and drama from Iowa State University in 1962. She later earned a master’s degree in counseling from Louisiana Tech University in Ruston.
She was married in 1961 to Ralph Waldo Emerson Jones Jr.
After moving to Baltimore in 1962, she joined city public schools and became an administrator. She served as vice principal at Polytechnic Institute, Northern High School and Frederick Douglass High School.
She was later named principal of Pimlico Middle School, one of the largest in the city. She was still there when she retired in 1994.
Mrs. Jones was known for a firm but compassionate style when it came to school leadership and her quest for educational excellence for students, family members said.
Her husband, an administrator of a graduate program at the University of Baltimore and head of the city’s Parks and Recreation Department during the administration of Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke, died in 1989.
Mrs. Jones was a longtime resident of Hillsdale Road in West Baltimore’s Howard Park neighborhood. She had served as president of the Baltimore Harbor chapter of Links Inc., and was an active member of Delta Sigma Theta sorority.
She was an active communicant of New All Saints Roman Catholic Church, where she regularly attended 4 p.m. Mass on Saturday and served as a member of the Food Pantry Committee.
In written instructions to family members regarding her death, Mrs. Jones urged: “Keep God in your life and enjoy the little things. Don’t take anything for granted.”
“I love you very, very much, and will plan to see you in the hereafter,” she wrote.
A Mass of Christian burial will be offered at 11 a.m. Monday at her church, 4408 Liberty Heights Ave.
Mrs. Jones is survived by three sons, Warren Waldo Jones of Middletown, Del., Ralph Eldridge Jones of Chapel Hill, N.C., and Ernest Emerson Jones of Orlando, Fla.; two sisters, Dr. Frankie Ernest Martin of Randallstown and Dr. Zola Ernest Boone of Ellicott City; four grandchildren; and many nieces and nephews.