Carol Richardson Strong

Carol Richardson Strong left this world on Thursday morning, June 13, 2024, for choir practice in her Heavenly Home where she will be happily singing again with her husband, Charlie. She will be with friends and family and will be free of all her pains and heartaches. 

Carol came into this world on December 18, 1936, to Raymond and Cloyce Weatherly Richardson in Falkner, Mississippi to join her sister, Annette (Stanbery). Unfortunately, Raymond was killed in an automobile accident when she was one and a half years old. 

Cloyce remarried Herman Jenkins and the family moved to Grand Junction, Tennessee. Herman was the only father that Carol ever knew. She was joined by another sister, Barbara (Fawcett). Next, she welcomed her brother, Jamie Jenkins and finally a sister, Ruth (Stinnett). She grew up on a farm south of Grand Junction surrounded by many Weatherly and Jenkins family members. She attended twelve years at Grand Junction High School where she was a member of the Beta Club, played basketball, and always led the invocational singing. As a member of the Methodist Church, she sang in the choir and, also played the piano. 

Following graduation in 1954, she enrolled at the Baptist School of Nursing in Memphis, Tennessee, maintaining the Dean's List each year. She graduated in 1957 as a Registered Nurse at Baptist Memorial Hospital and began a lifelong career of nursing others. After a short time as a nurse at Baptist Hospital, she began working as a Private Scrub Nurse (a term used today as a Doctor's Assistant) for Dr. Ralph Braun, a leading cancer surgeon at the time. 

While in Memphis she joined and sang in the Glee Club Choir of Central Christian Church, Disciples of Christ. There she met Charles S. Strong III, where they were married on March 27, 1976. She and Charlie sang many beautiful duets at their church. 

They later moved to Little Rock, Arkansas where she worked as a Surgical Nurse at St. Vincent's Hospital. For a while they moved to Phoenix, Arizona but after a short, few years moved back to Little Rock and St Vincent's Hospital. She retired there in 2004 after serving her entire career as a Surgical Nurse. 

In Little Rock, Carol was invited to join the prestigious Little Rock Departmental Club, an organization that does philanthropic work, most notably, scholarships for nursing students at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Carol was later elected President of this club and was ecstatic to be asked to pin the medical insignia on the graduating nurses. 

Carol was very devoted to her family, taking great care of her parents and guiding her siblings into adulthood. 

She moved to Christian Care Center of Bolivar, Tennessee in August of 2022 where she organized a choir to continue her love of singing, and they sang a concert for others there. 

Carol was preceded in death by her parents Cloyce Richardson Jenkins (Raymond Richardson and Herman Jenkins), her husband Charlie Strong, and a sister, Annette Stanbery (Cecil, deceased) of Cleveland, Tennessee; and a nephew, William Cecil Stanbery. She is survived by her sister Barbara J. Fawcett (Travis) of Hickory Valley, Tennessee, her brother, Jamie H. Jenkins (Jean) of Somerville, TN, and sister, Ruth J. Clifft Stinnett (Don, deceased) of Southaven, Mississippi. 

Funeral services will be held at 4 PM, Saturday, June 15, 2024, at Shackelford’s Bolivar chapel. Visitation will be from 2 -4 pm.  She will be laid to rest beside her husband in Grand Junction Cemetery. Memorials may be made to Grand Junction Cemetery Trust at PO Box 632, Grand Junction, TN, 38039.