Homegoing Service Held for Jessie Lee Walton

Mrs. Jessie Lee Walton

The life of Mrs. Jessie Lee Walton was celebrated by family and friends on May 18 at St. Malachy's Church. A Los Angeles resident for more than 50 years as well as a member of Macedonia Baptist Church, she passed away on May 9 at the age of 92.

Mrs. Walton was born to Louis and Blanche Becoat in Louisiana and raised in Illinois. After graduating high school in 1938, she moved to Chicago and worked for the U.S. Postal Service.

In 1949, she relocated to California where she met and married the love of her life, James Warren Walton, a Pullman Porter with Southern Pacific Railroad. They eloped, catching the train, and married in 1950. From their union, two daughters were born.

Mrs. Walton worked many years as a seamstress, but always said her happiest job was as the housekeeper at St. Malachy's Convent. She transported the children for catechism classes, walked them from school to St. Malachy's, assisted with the lunch line, led PTA Meetings, and once even sat in as Santa Claus when the original actor became ill. She was always everything to everybody.

Following the death of her husband in 1972, Mrs. Walton studied and passed the test for cafeteria worker with the Los Angeles Unified School District. In 1982, Mrs. Walton kicked colon cancer ‘to the curb.' She simply told the Lord that she had too much left to do, and she was healed from that.

Mrs. Walton retired in 1994 and devoted much time to her grandchildren. Also, she enjoyed gardening, traveling, crochet, knitting, macramé, horticulture, aerobics, water aerobics, and walking around her neighborhood.

In 2009, Mrs. Walton suffered a stroke that ultimately led to Alzheimer's, however, she remained cognizant until the Lord decided to bring her home.

She was preceded in death by her parents, two brothers, and one sister. She leaves to cherish her memory daughters, Carolyn and Pamela; son-in-law, Sylvester Franklin Joseph; grandchildren Jimmy, Jessee, Joey, and Yanni, and a host of relatives and friends.

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