Josephine Gwendolyn Williamson, a beloved mother and devoted school cook with a can-do spirit, died Monday, December 8, in Irving, Texas after a courageous battle with dementia-related causes. She was 95.

Jo was born in Tonkawa, Oklahoma on August 6, 1930, to John and Rhoda Francis (Fannie) Cathey. She attended Tonkawa Public Schools. She married Ernest Dale Williamson in June 1948, at the Christian Church in Tonkawa. Dale and Jo were blessed with two adopted children, Darla Kay and Eric Dale. They started their family in rural Nardin, Oklahoma and moved to a farm in rural Tonkawa in 1967, moving into town after a devastating flood in October of 1973.

Jo worked at the Tonkawa High School Cafeteria between the mid-'60s and early '80s. As a pastry and bread cook and a server at the cafeteria, she learned most of the kids' first names so she could personally greet them as they came through the line every day, sometimes giving them an extra hot roll or cookie. She loved her job and interacting with the kids. She tried to bring a smile to their face. "I might be the only person they see today with a smile, so I passed it on," she would say.

Early in her marriage, she worked side by side with Dale on the farm. She helped her elderly mother dress chickens on her farm and was very close to all of her sisters, brothers and her extended family of in-laws. One of her earliest memories was from her first-grade teacher who wrote on the blackboard, "I CAN!" Josephine took that message to heart and did her best at all she loved to do.

Jo was the middle child in a family of nine brothers and sisters. She did a lot of babysitting through the years of many nieces and nephews. All those kids would love to go out to "Aunt Jo and Uncle Dale's" farm and play games, run around and eat some of that good farm cooking she was known for. She enjoyed and loved all the kids and had plenty of great stories she told about each one from their visits over the years.

She was preceded in death by her parents, John and Rhoda Francis (Fannie) Cathey; brothers: Marshall, Lewis, Jim and Jack; sisters: Margurette Carter-Hudkins, Louise Yeager, Ona Belle Watson, Betty Cremers-Campbell and Madeline Williamson.

She is survived by her children, Darla Davis of Norman, OK and Eric Williamson of Irving, TX. Grandchildren, Lindsey Kedy-Cordova and husband Matt Cordova of Austin, TX, Kevin Kedy of Bartlesville, OK, and Carly Williamson of Norman, OK.

Honorary pallbearers include Steve Ward, Vernon Young, Randy Paige, David Kersey, Jerry Howard, Kevin Kedy, and Matt Cordova.

A funeral service is scheduled for 1:00 PM, Friday, December 12, at the Tonkawa United Methodist Church. Burial to follow at Blackwell Cemetery.