Dorothy Jobes Crawford

Dorothy Jobes Crawford died after a short illness Thursday, June 10th, seven months shy of her 100th birthday. She was born and raised in Westmont, NJ. Her parents, Serena and Arthur Jobes, were reluctant to see their only child go far afield, but she convinced them to let her enroll in Maryville College in 1939 after hearing about the school through her church. There she met her husband of 70 years, Roy Crawford Sr., a Maryville attorney who died in 2016.

After two years at Maryville College, Dorothy completed her bachelor’s degree at Mary Washington College in Fredericksburg, VA. She taught Home Economics in New Jersey while her future husband was deployed in Europe during WWII. Upon his return in 1946, they were married at the Haddonfield Presbyterian Church in New Jersey and moved to East Tennessee. Dorothy taught at Tyson Junior High School in Knoxville for three years, before she and her husband moved to Maryville.

The Crawfords raised three children in Maryville. Son Roy Crawford Jr. (daughter-in-law Cathy Henderson Crawford), who was Blount County Clerk for 27 years, died in 2016. Daughter Serena Crawford died along with her husband Gregory Robertson in 1990 in a car accident in Atlanta. Daughter Mary Crawford and son-in-law Calvin Mew reside in New York City. Dorothy has a grandson Alexander Robertson (Lindsay) and a great-grandson in Boston, MA, and her granddaughter Elizabeth Robertson (Dan Fowler) and two great-grandchildren live in Anchorage, AK.

Dorothy was very involved in church and community activities in Maryville. She worked at the front end to establish two programs that provide important care today, Blount Memorial Hospice and the Bartlett Adult Day Out Program, and she worked as a volunteer in both programs for years. At New Providence Presbyterian Church she served as a Deacon, Sunday school teacher, and leader in the Presbyterian Women’s Association. She was also an active member of the Chilhowee Club, the Maryville Music Club, and the Maryville College Alumni Association.

Active until the end of her life, she could be seen by her neighbors most days taking a one-half mile walk. And at age 94, after the death of her son and husband in 2016, Dorothy travelled to Paris and Normandy in France with a group of family and friends to see where her husband had landed in Europe five months after D-Day. She was especially grateful for extended family and the Asbury at Home caregivers who provided assistance to her in the last years of her life and allowed her to remain in her home.

Dorothy established a scholarship fund at Maryville College to honor three graduates, Reverend Hal Lloyd, Dr. Sam Crawford, and her husband Roy, and celebrate their lifelong friendship that was forged growing up on the campus. In lieu of flowers, gifts may be made to this Maryville College scholarship fund or to New Providence Presbyterian Church.

A memorial service will be held at New Providence Presbyterian Church at 2:00 pm on Saturday, June 26, 2021.