At ease, Marine

Sullins, Chris and Mary Belle asked, and writing it was the least I could do:

Joe Stuart loved her country first. Her family was a closer second than a photo finish could capture.

Third place? Choose among her community, her friends, flowers, her farm, bridge, her employees, tennis, travel, education, women’s and children’s issues, the library, general philanthropy. . . .

But never forget Nos. 1 and 2, especially every July 4, when she opened her home at Hardwick Farms, on North Lee Hwy. just north of Stuart Road (named for her), for star-spangled food, fireworks and music that sprung straight from a heart forged in World War II. That’s when she signed up with the U.S. Marines and found herself the only woman on a troop train bound for basic training at Camp Lejeune.

Years later she told the story in a rasping drawl: “Since my name is Joe – I was named for my great-grandfather, and that’s how he spelled his name – there I was in a train full of other Marine recruits, all of them men. They were wonderful gentlemen. They rigged blankets up so I could have a private place to sleep.” She included the story, with pride, in the archives of the Women in Military Service to America Memorial, at Arlington, and she always stood with squared shoulders to receive the many service honors she earned.

Her beloved husband, D.S. Stuart II, was on a different wartime train, in a different direction, but duty had called. They both answered. And she wore the Marine Corps emblem around her neck for the rest of her life.

In many ways that life, which began on Nov. 22, 1922, was charmed. She was the descendant of prominent Cleveland families – Hardwicks, Jarnigans, Knoxes – and her charities were made possible because she was involved in Hardwick Woolen Mills, Hardwick Stove, real estate, banking and other interests. But in many ways Joe’s was a life as simple as growing, weeding, cooking and canning.

Until it ended on Feb. 27, 2009, it was a life full of children: their son, David Sullins Stuart III, of Ft. Myers and Key West, Fl.; and daughters Harris Knox Stuart, who died in 2002; Chris Stuart Jenkins, of Cleveland; and Mary Stuart Browder, of Asheville, N.C.

And that generation begat and begat, with more offspring to cluck about, while Joe – “Jodie” to her nearest and dearest – was skeet-shooting, and organizing Cleveland’s first garden club, and
tarpon-fishing in Florida, and winning country club tennis tournaments, and opening a florist shop with a swear-like-a-sailor parrot, and underwriting the Day School (with its marvelous
fundraising dinner-dances – who else would invite Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington to Cleveland?), and donating downtown land for the library, and founding the child shelter, and staging marvelous barn parties to highlight the Hardwick Players, and launching summertime bridge tournaments that drew friendly contestants from Dallas to D.C. She earned Life Master at bridge, and was proud of it.

During all that, you got the feeling that she was planning for every December, when she turned Hardwick Farms into a Christmas fairyland, with thousands of blown-glass balls decking her 1920s-vintage halls, to provide millions of courtesies that her friends would never forget.

Still and ever, important as friends were, there was family. She treasured the memories of those who died before her: Joe’s husband, D.S.; her father, Lt. Col. James F. Corn, and mother, Irene Knox Corn; her dear Aunt Adella Knox Jarnigan; and her brother, Jimmy; along with her beloved daughter Harris and granddaughter Emily Irene Jenkins.

And she doted on those who survive: the children mentioned earlier, along with grandchildren Sullins Stuart IV and his Sarah, Amy Langlo and her Roger, Allister Littell and her Mike, Elizabeth Ferguson and her Scott, Lollie Bekkevold and her Raymond, John Jenkins, Sarah
Jenkins, Will Jenkins, Laura Jenkins, Julia Browder, Joe Browder, Michael Hall and his Amy, and Chris Hall. And in the next generation: great-grandchildren Tristan Stuart, Emily Stuart, Kirsten Langlo, Zachary Littell, Kaitlin Littell, Jacob Littell, Knox Foss, Holland Foss and Colton Browder.

Count also the nieces and nephews, among them James F. Corn III, Donna Corn Ziebell, Laura Corn Bishop, Hardwick Stuart Jr. and Cynthia Stuart Mock.

Joe’s extended family will receive friends on Thursday, March 12, 2009, from noon to 3 p.m. at the Museum Center at 5ive Points, on Inman Street. There will be a graveside service, with full military honors, on July 4 at Fort Hill Cemetery.

She would consider your duty done if you played “Taps” in your heart in her memory, but if you would care to make a donation, you could consider the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Chattanooga, 510 Willow Street, Chattanooga, TN 37404; or the charity of your choice.