Florence Virginia Helm Jones 97 died Sunday October 27 2013 of cancer. Visitation will be Friday November 1 2013 from 5-7 p.m. at North's Funeral Home 242 Orange Street. Funeral services will be Saturday November 2 2013 at 11:00 a.m. at the Episcopal Church of the Heavenly Rest. Her ashes will then join those of her beloved husband at West Point Military Academy. Florence was born September 15 1916 in Portsmouth Virginia. She was the first of six children of Amy Olsson Helm and Ray Palmer Helm. After graduation in Benton Harbor Michigan she worked first for a dentist then for the electric company until she wed her childhood sweetheart Lee Glasier Jones. They were married in St. Joseph Michigan on June 6 1942 immediately after his graduation from West Point. While Lee an electrical engineer worked on guided weaponry first in the United States Army then as a civilian Florence created a stable nurturing home for her family and volunteered for church and community. She rolled bandages and sat with the sick in wartime and sponsored Girl Scouts Cub Scouts and youth groups in peacetime. While her husband was in Korea she volunteered daily at the local high school after learning the nurse's office had a desk a couch and a box of Band Aids but no nurse. While working in army civilian and church thrift stores Florence applied St. Matthew's guideline for charity "when you give to the needy do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing". She worked twice a week in Heavenly Rest's Thrift House on Walnut for the last sixteen years and was co-chairman for the last six years. When Lee entered his third career as supervisor for three New Jersey nursing homes Florence accompanied her husband in geriatric training and college coursework. Still a volunteer she was a driver for nursing homes manned the library at a woman's prison served on the judiciary panel for youth offenders and was file clerk at the police station. After coming to Abilene in 1995 in addition to her work at Thrift House Florence dressed twenty-seven dolls for Goodfellows sewed more than one hundred crib sheets for Abilene Day Care and gave scholarships for nursing students. She also helped buy uniforms first for the cheerleaders of a 2A school and later for players on a youth football team. Florence used to say she never turned down an invitation or an opportunity. On a beach in North Carolina during the Second World War she learned to shoot a pistol "just in case" of invasion. When troop movement consumed all transportation refusing to miss one last chance to see Lee before he shipped overseas she squeezed onto the platform between train cars and rode Raleigh North Carolina to New York on the outside. She also got poison ivy a Camp Edith Macy while training to be a Girl Scout leader and learned to crew on the Chesapeake Bay. Florence loved parties balls and get-togethers. Her theme parties were a surprise and delight whether it was a zoo party with life-sized plywood animals or a costume mystery party on the Orient Express. Well into her nineties Florence had season tickets for ACT and Abilene Philharmonic played bridge at Woman's Club and socialized with St. Margaret's Circle and Sunday's Breakfast Bunch. Sometimes it was hard to find time for those doctors' appointments. Florence is preceded in death by her husband; by her sisters Mary Hays Ruth Gardner Jeanne Reese and Joyce Miskill; and by her brother James Helm. She is survived by two children Amy Jones Lang of Abilene and Lee Glasier Jones Jr. of Houston and by nine grandchildren and thirteen great-grandchildren. Online condolences can be made at www.northsfuneralhome.com.