June Carolyn Williams

Services for June Carolyn Williams, 84, Lawrence, will be at 2 p.m. Thursday at Rumsey-Yost Funeral Home. Burial will be in Memorial Park Cemetery.
Mrs. Williams died Saturday, June 19, 2010, at her home.
She was born July 5, 1925, in Lawrence, the daughter of William Thomas and Vestle Elnora Elliott Lemon. The family moved to a rural farm southeast of Lawrence where she attended the one-room Franklin Elementary School through eighth grade. She graduated from Liberty Memorial High School in 1943.
After graduation she worked for the war effort at the Pratt & Whitney engine plant in Kansas City. After the war in 1945 she started as a server at Myron Green on the Plaza and later for 10 years in the “Silver Service” at the prestigious Kansas City Club. She traveled to Fort Lauderdale, New Jersey, then San Francisco. While in San Francisco she was hired by the Matson Cruise Line and started on the S.S. Lurline. Later she served on the line’s flagship, the S.S. Mastonia. She was injured on The Mastonia during a typhoon in 1959 and was hospitalized in Los Angeles.
While recovering in Los Angeles, she met Francis James “Jim” Williams. They were later married in Las Vegas in 1960 and settled in the Los Angeles area. In the early 1970s they moved back to Lawrence and built a home near her family’s original homestead. She enjoyed cooking, sewing, and the Liberty Memorial High School Wednesday Lunch Bunch.
Jim worked for the city of Lawrence and Lawrence Memorial Hospital. He preceded her in death in 1991.
Survivors include “The Lunch Bunch,” her friends around the world, and her faithful cat, Missy.
Friends may call from noon to 8 p.m. Wednesday and from 9 a.m. to service time Thursday at the funeral home, where the family will receive friends from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. Thursday.
The family suggests memorials to Douglas County Visiting Nurses, Rehabilitation and Hospice Care or the Lawrence Humane Society, sent in care of the funeral home, 601 Ind., Lawrence, KS 66044.
Online condolences may be sent at rumsey-yost.com.