Mary Patricia Jones

Mary Patricia J. Jones died on February 11, 2024 in Alexandria, VA at the age of 96 of natural causes. She was born in Washington, DC to Paul Leland Jenkinson and Edna Yokum Jenkinson. She grew up in Arlington, VA and worked at Washington National Airport in the offices of American Airlines. A girl friend had moved to Las Cruces, NM to marry her boyfriend. Mary Pat flew out to visit and met their friend, Alton Jones, in February 1954. She transferred to American Airlines in El Paso in March and they were married in June of the same year. After living a brief time in Washington, DC, then four years in Florida, they settled in Cheverly, MD to raise their family of five kids. With their kids grown, they moved back to Alamogordo, NM where they had always wanted to live.

Alton Emmett Jones (July 21, 1926 - October 14, 2019) was born in Alamogordo, NM to Thomas William Jones and Mary Elizabeth Gregg Jones. He grew up on a cattle ranch called Mulberry east of El Paso, TX. He joined the Army Air Corps and was stationed at Roswell Army Air Base where he served for 10 months. He attended college in Las Cruces, NM graduating with a BS in electrical engineering in 1950. Alton worked at the Naval Research Lab, then NASA for 35 years on the Vanguard program and on several communication satellites including ECHO, Relay, Telstar & SYNCOM. He eventually became Director of Flight Assurance at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

They are survived by their five children: Janet Adams (Steve), Gail Sorokowsky (John), Marcia Brown (Dodson), Leah Choudhury (Shah), & Thomas Jones; their eleven grandchildren: Laura (Pat), Steve (Amanda), Staci (Jeremy), Cara, Michelle, Joseph, Eric (Amber), Nicholas, Patrick, Shahad, Anjum; and their four greatgrandchildren: Collin, Ethan, Savannah and Tyler.