Obituary of Jean Kay Mudd

Jean Kay Mudd was born on February 13, 1924, in Flagler, Colorado, to Flora Belle (Moss) and George M. Baxter. Jean was preceded in birth by her older brother, Judson. Jean attended public school in Flagler, graduating in 1942, and went on to college at Colorado Teachers College, what is now the University of Northern Colorado. She graduated from CTC in 1946 with a degree in Business Education and a minor in Music Education. After college, Jean taught business education at Evanston High School, Evanston, Wyoming for 2 years. In 1948 Jean married John L. Mudd, and they moved to Laramie, Wyoming, where John was a student in the School of Engineering at the University of Wyoming. They had two girls, Barbara Jean, born August 22, 1951, and Janet Marie, born May 8, 1953. Jean and John divorced in 1954. Jean moved to Flagler in 1954, where she and the girls lived with her mother. She took a job with Flagler Public Schools where she was secretary to the superintendent and taught business education. Jean retired teaching in 1980 after 26 years in education. For five years after retirement Jean lived in Denver and worked as an administrative assistant at the JHB Button Company. She also was a partner in a needlework shop in Boulder, Colorado, with a group of friends from college. Jean returned to Flagler in 1986 where she enjoyed fellowship with friends in the community. She was a member of the Congregational Church of Flagler, joining in 1933. The Church was a focal point in her life where she sang in the choir, served as church treasurer for many years, and worked in the Bargain Shop. Even into her 90's, though her eyesight prevented her from reading music, she could sing along to hymns memorized over the years and attend Bible study. The town of Flagler was very important to Jean, including activities at the school, participation in the Flagler Historical Society, lunch at the Creighton Senior Center, and water aerobics at the Flagler Pool. She closely followed local sports activities, graduations, weddings and births. Jean was an ardent traveler, starting with trips with her parents to the World's Fair in New York and also in Chicago. When her brother, Jud, joined the Navy she lived in San Francisco with him and his wife, Felicia, for a summer. She and Flo took her girls on family vacations to California and South Dakota. After she retired, Jean traveled with her former sorority sister, Willy Rautenstrauss, on cruises to Europe, The Caribbean and Hawaii. She was also able to travel to Japan with her daughter, Barb, to visit her grandson and his family in 1999. In the summer of 2012, Jean traveled with her two daughters and her son-in-law, Ed Caruso, to New York, New Jersey and Washington DC, where she fulfilled a dream to visit the White House. Ed pushed her wheelchair through the cobblestone streets of Lower Manhattan in New York City, and past the Washington and Lincoln memorials, as well as the Smithsonian Museum of American History in DC. Another passion for Jean was music. On the day she was born, in 1924, George Gershwin wrote 'Rhapsody in Blue', which was her favorite song. Her mother, Flo, was a talented pianist and organist who passed along musical abilities to Jean as she learned to read music and sing, as well as master the saxophone at an early age. She played in a dance band in college during the war years, and as a music minor in college, was required to learn to play many other instruments besides the sax. Jean was a lifelong lover of jazz music, but appreciated many other genres of music as well. Jean was preceded in death by her father, George Baxter, in 1948, her mother, Flo, in 1975, and her brother, Jud, in 1990. She is survived by her daughters, Barbara and Janet, sons in-law Mark and Ed, her grandson, Aaron Short and his wife Sachiko, niece, Pamela Hasbrouck and husband Wally, and three great-grandchildren, Cory, Ryan and Ansel Short.