Julia Anne Stanton Bales

Julia Anne Stanton Bales, beloved wife, mother, and grandmother, left this life on Friday, June 10, 2016.

Everyone who knew her will long remember Julie as a kind, caring, well-beloved, and capable woman of shining character and integrity. She had a warm laugh that expressed her joys and a sensitive soul for those in need of support.

Julie was born in 1922 and grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, the oldest of six children and the daughter of long-time public defender of Memphis, Hugh Stanton. She excelled in drama and played Jo in Little Women on the radio while she was in high school. She graduated as valedictorian of her high school class and was the first scholarship student sent to college by Mr. and Mrs. Cecil and Boyce Gooch. The Gooches found their experience with Julie so rewarding that they formed the C.M. Gooch Foundation and provided scholarship aid to over twelve thousand other deserving students from the Mid-South region over the next forty years.

Julie, an intellectually gifted woman, attended Dodd Junior College in Shreveport, Louisiana for one semester, but then reported to Mrs. Gooch that it was too easy and not the best use of their money. Mrs. Gooch then arranged for Julie to enter Randolph-Macon Women's College in Lynchburg, Virginia which proved to be a perfect fit. Never one to shy away from "hard" subjects, Julie graduated with a major in math and minors in chemistry and Latin.

She went to work for a Pathology Professor at the University of Tennessee Medical School who studied the effects of smallpox vaccine on mice. She carried a small table by herself, from one laboratory to another, and this attracted the attention of the man who became her husband, Dr. Donald W. Bales. "I liked the way she moved that table," Don often told his children. Julie and Don were married in 1945 and lived in Detroit, Michigan for Don's internship and residency in medicine. Julie worked in an insurance company there until they were sent to Heidelberg, Germany for Don's service in the Army.

In 1952, they moved to Kingsport, Tennessee where they raised four children: Ginny, Don Jr., Bart, and Jack. Julie was a kind and loving mother who, in a spirit of love, sang each of her four children to sleep each night at bedtime.

Julie was very active in church and community affairs, serving as a Homeroom Mother, Girl Scout leader, director of the Church School at Broad St. Church, president of the League of Women Voters, and president of the Parent-Teacher Association (PTA) of Jackson School. She had a beautiful alto voice and was a member of the Kingsport Symphony Chorus and the church Bell Choir for many years. For several years, she also wrote a column for the church newspaper. In each column, she described one church member and the particular gifts and talents that person brought to the church community. An excellent bread baker, she also served in a bread ministry where they brought home-made loaves of bread to shut-ins and members of the church who might enjoy a delicious loaf of bread and a visit.

Julie Bales was notable for her even temper and her ability to manage a household full of children (her own and their friends), her mother-in-law who lived with the family for seven years, a husband with a demanding job, and a succession of cats and dogs, while remaining calm, kind and loving toward everyone. She was unfailingly responsible and the welfare of her family was always her prime consideration. She was the most unselfish person anyone in the immediate family has ever known. She and her husband were devoted to each other and shared seventy-one years of happy marriage.

She was predeceased by her sisters, Sarah Elizabeth Stanton Garner and Louise Stanton Payne; and her brother, Hugh Stanton Jr.

She will be warmly remembered and sorely missed by her husband, Dr. Don Bales; her children, Ginny (Jay Gitlin), Don (engaged to Sarah Heenan), Bart, and Jack (Dorothy Barnhouse); and grandchildren, Basie Bales Gitlin, Katy and Molly Bales, Celia Stanton Bales, Lucy Elizabeth Bales, and Ella Stanton Bales; and sisters, Georgia Elinor Stanton Curtis and Ida Stanton Holmes.

A memorial service will be held at First Broad Street United Methodist Church in Kingsport, Tennessee on Sunday July 3, 2016, at 2 p.m. with Rev. Joe Green and Rev. Spurgeon McCartt officiating. There will be a reception in the Social Hall following the service.

Memorial contributions can be made to the Carpenter's Helpers Ministry, 100 East Church Circle, Kingsport TN 37660, or the music programs of First Broad St. United Methodist Church, also 100 East Church Circle, Kingsport, TN 37660.