Criseyde S. Jones

Criseyde S. Jones (Cris), a West Tisbury resident for six decades, died on March 16, 2022, at Fall River HealthCare. She was 89. 

Born on Jan. 3, 1933, in El Dorado, Ark., Cris came by her Chaucerian first name honestly: Her father, Weldon Stone, was a Texas-born playwright and English teacher, and her mother, Louisiana-born Katherine (“K”) Moss Stone, a longtime librarian. Not surprisingly, Cris was an avid reader who fostered the love of language in others. To the end of her life, she was a force to be reckoned with in word games from Scrabble to Bananagrams.

She received her undergraduate degree at the University of Louisville, and later earned a master’s degree from Tufts University in child study and human development, with a focus on early childhood intervention. 

Cris married Kenneth M. (“Mal”) Jones in Germany in 1957. By way of a honeymoon, they drove across the Sahara together in a VW bus. After Cris attended photography school in Santa Barbara, Calif., she and Mal moved in 1960 to a small camp on Deep Bottom Cove, Tisbury Great Pond, thus beginning her decades-long relationship with the Vineyard. Though the marriage eventually ended, her connection to West Tisbury and Martha’s Vineyard never did. 

Cris’s love of language continued on Martha’s Vineyard, where she helped organize writing workshops following guidelines developed by English professor and longtime Vineyard summer visitor Peter Elbow in his book “Writing Without Teachers,” first published in 1973 and still in print. Cris was among those Elbow acknowledged as having “helped or taught me in my efforts to write this book.” Later, she became a regular volunteer for the West Tisbury library’s annual book sale.

While raising her children, Cris was active both creatively and politically. An early member of the National Organization for Women (NOW), she spoke out against the Vietnam War and in favor of reproductive rights and environmental responsibility. She started the Christiantown Gallery in Christiantown, West Tisbury, with her new friend Bonnie Miller. A skilled potter herself, she stopped by to visit Tom Thatcher in his pottery studio on the Edgartown Road — a visit that grew into a lifelong friendship. 

She almost always shared her home with a dog, and often a cat. Her kids, Annie and Owen, had ponies as children, and she often rode with them. Marjorie Manter Rogers was her friend and mentor in all things equestrian. She relished all opportunities to be out in the natural world. While living on Deep Bottom Cove, she would sail her Sunfish across the pond so she could walk on the barrier beach. Later, when living in town, she had to drive, but however she got there, she treasured her hours by the ocean. 

In the mid-1980s, Cris put her master’s degree to professional use as an early childhood specialist, working first on the Cape and Islands, and then for the San Bernardino Office of Education in California, where her job made use of her ability to speak Spanish. She worked in San Bernardino for 15 years, returning to the Vineyard every summer and on most vacations, until she retired in 2004.

Cris was an only child, but she was also one of many cousins who descended from the Moss side of her mother’s family. She maintained very close contact with them and their children her entire life.

Cris is survived by her daughter, Annie Nichols, of Rehoboth; son Owen Jones, of Lakeville; granddaughter Sarah Nichols of Fall River, and grandson Kevin Nichols of Warwick, R.I. She was laid to rest in the West Tisbury cemetery next to her mother, “Mimi” Stone, who spent her last years on the Island. A memorial gathering is being planned for this summer. 

Donations in Cris’s memory would be appreciated either to the Friends of the West Tisbury Library (checks may be sent to P.O. Box 905,West Tisbury, MA 02575) or to the Rev. Raphael Warnock’s campaign for re-election to the U.S. Senate from Georgia, at Brad Kennedy, Warnock for Georgia, P.O. Box 52227, Atlanta, GA 30355, or online at secure.actblue.com/donate/bkrb.