A life devoted to life-giving
Published: April 1, 2005
Section: Local, page B1
Source: ELIZABETH SIMPSON
© 2005- Landmark Communications Inc.
NORFOLK - BY ELIZABETH SIMPSON THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT


NORFOLK - Georgeanna S. Jones was a medical pioneer, a dedicated researcher, a compassionate doctor.

She was a teacher, mentor, friend.

And she was a caring wife and mother.

"The amazing thing was she did all these things so well, and she did them simultaneously," said Dr. Howard Jones III, her oldest son.

He was one of hundreds who gathered for a memorial at Eastern Virginia Medical School on Thursday to pay tribute to Georgeanna Jones, who died of heart failure at 92 on Saturday.

Georgeanna Jones and her husband, Howard, are known world wide for their research in reproductive science. Their work together led to the nation's first "test-tube" baby, Elizabeth Carr, in 1981.

Roger Carr, the father of that headline-making baby, attended Thursday's ceremony with his wife, Judith, and gave heart felt thanks for the breakthrough work that Jones and her husband achieved by taking on the challenge of in vitro fertilization.

"She is now in a place where she can watch over the thousands of children she made possible," Carr said.

Scientists, clinicians, family and friends remembered Georgeanna Jones as a meticulous researcher with impeccable standards, but also as a warm and compassionate doctor. She had an elegance, a sensibility and an intuition that helped her as researcher, doctor, teacher, wife, and mother of three.

"This gracious, caring lady showed us all how life should best be lived," said Dr. Mason Andrews, the EVMS doctor who persuaded the Joneses to come to Norfolk from Johns Hopkins University in 1978.

The Joneses' first in vitro patient, Sarah Smith, remembered how "Dr. Georgeanna" held her hand through the eight in vitro attempts it took for Smith to give birth to twin daughters. "The sparkle in her eyes would lift my spirits up," Smith said. "We will miss Georgeanna, but we will always see her in the faces of our children."

The memorial also paid tribute to the 64-year marriage and collaboration between Georgeanna and Howard Jones. The couple worked face to face at partner desks and owned a single car, in which they drove together to work at the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine, named in their honor.

Howard Jones, who is 94, attended the memorial and listened from the front row as his children told stories with tears and laughter. Howard Jones III relayed an incident when his parents were once at a long-winded memorial of a colleague and needed to leave as the hour neared midnight. Georgeanna dropped to her hands and knees and led the way crawling through the banquet hall to the exit.

"Mom thought outside the box long before that phrase was invented," said her son, who is now a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn.

The Joneses' youngest child, Lawrence, remembered the moment he told his mother he was going to pursue business instead of medicine, like his brother and sister, Georgeanna Jones Klingensmith, a professor of pediatrics in Denver. He had dreaded the moment but was relieved when his mother gave him a hug and said:

"There are many professions which people follow, and many things people do other than medicine." Then, after a pause, "I just don't know what they are."

"I never thought of her as 'Dr. Georgeanna,' " Lawrence Jones said. "To me, she was simply Mom."

The family also thanked Georgeanna's long time caregivers, Nancy Garcia and nurse Doris Gentilini, who cared for her until her death last week. Even when Alzheimer's disease stole much of Georgeanna's memory in her later years, remnants of her true spirit remained.

"Her gentle nature never wavered," said Lucinda Veeck Gosden, the first embryologist at the Jones Institute and now associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Cornell University in New York.

Elizabeth Carr, who is now a journalist, was unable to attend the ceremony but sent a written statement with her father, which read, in part:

"Thank you, Georgeanna, for all you gave me and the other IVF children around the world."


* Reach Elizabeth Simpson at 446-2635 or elizabeth.simpson @pilotonline.com.

{CAPTION} Chris Tyree photos/The Virginian-Pilot

Dr. Howard Jones Jr., husband of the late Dr. Georgeanna S. Jones, is greeted by Mason Poling and his mother, Georgeanna Neal Poling, right, on Thursday. The Joneses were married for 64 years. Their daughter, Georgeanna J. Klingensmith, is seated at left.Dr. Georgeanna S. Jones was remembered by her family, friends and people she helped to conceive children at her memorial service Thursday.chris tyree photos/the virginian-pilot

"Mom thought outside the box long before that phrase was invented," said her son Howard Jones III, above center, who is now a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Vanderbilt University. He is flanked by his sister, Georgeanna J. Klingensmith, left, and his wife, Patricia. Roger and Judith Carr, the parents of the nation's first "test-tube" baby, shared their daughter's statement with the crowd: "Thank you, Georgeanna, for all you gave me and the other IVF children around the world."