Jerry Bailey Austin

Jerry Bailey Austin, a wife, mother, and grandmother, a Christian who gave of herself to her community and loved ones, and a true friend to many, went home to our Lord in the early morning of October 31st, 2023. She was 73.

Born at Crawford Long Hospital to parents Hugo and Georgia Bailey, Jerry grew up in the Atlanta neighborhood Brookhaven with her parents, her sister Jackie, and her brother Rick. She was the youngest of her siblings.

As a girl Jerry spent weekends on Ponce de Leon Avenue with her grandmother Ada Leola and her great aunt Clara, who together owned boarding houses along the avenue. She loved the city and was devoted to her great aunt, a woman who cast permanent and happy memories. Clara would take her niece around the city and the city's downtown; decades later, Jerry still would talk of the adventure, as a little girl, of walking the floors and showrooms of the grand brick-and-glass Sears Roebuck building.

Over childhood summers, Jerry often would stay at her Aunt Mary's home in Coral Gables, Florida, growing brown in the sun from afternoons on the beach.

At sixteen, Jerry traveled to western Europe. Commercial flight was young then, and the prop plane she flew in had to stop in Reykjavik, Iceland to refuel. She spent a year in Europe, much of it in Italy, though she also traveled through Belgium, France, and Holland, and hiked the Alps. Before leaving she retrieved her nieces, Jackie's children Tammy and Traci, to bring back to the U.S.

Returning home, she graduated high school and then relocated to the American-Canadian border, where she served as a tour guide at Niagara Falls. The morning after the city's first blizzard, Jerry walked out of her apartment to dig her car out of the drifts. One time was enough for her to decide she would not remain in the north.

A year after returning to Atlanta, a mutual friend, Charlie Cash, led her to a chance meeting with a young engineering student. James Austin was a sophomore at Georgia Tech, and Jerry was looking for football tickets. She was not interested in a date and over the phone let James know in no uncertain terms, a rebuff that nearly ended things. As James apologized and was about to hang up she stopped him, however, saying that any friend of Charlie's must be a decent guy. She would let him take her to the game. Only later did James reveal the truth: he had actually never met Charlie Cash.

She and James dated, and married in October 1975.

In 1982, Jerry became concerned when she began experiencing strange cravings for food and eating everything in the house. Eventually she visited the doctor, fearing life-altering bad news. After a series of tests, the doctor offered his prognosis. The news was shocking, and the kind of thing to alter her life, though it was not so bad as she had thought. She was pregnant.

January the following year she gave birth to what would be her only child, Benjamin Austin. The next eighteen years she invested in loving and raising her son.

Jerry remained active her entire life. Never one to sit, when it was warm, she was outside in her yard, planting, weeding, mulching. On weekends, and when it was cold, she was in the house, scrubbing floors and dusting, or rearranging furniture. She loved music, and Saturday mornings old folk and love songs would turn on the record player.

Outside of family, her love for community, fellowship, and faith came together to form her life's great passion. Jerry volunteered her time and energy: at her son's school when he was young, at nursing homes and hospitals, at the local Habitat for Humanity. She maintained a wide circle of contacts and had a special connection with children and elders. Those who needed help could sense a warmth within her.

Belief in God was a matter of special importance. Jerry's faith set her direction and purpose. Everything that happens, happens for a reason, she said, because everything was part of God's plan.

But probably the most defining feature of Jerry Austin was the immensity of her heart. She was a woman who, in her sufferings and her joys, felt more deeply than almost anyone else.

Jerry is survived by her husband of 48 years James Austin; son and daughter-in-law, Ben and Bene Austin; grandchildren, Henry, Elijah and Eleanor Austin; her brother, Rick Bailey and sister-in-law Judy Bailey; her nieces, Tammy Bramlette and Traci Zurfluh; her sister-in-law, April Morgan and her husband John Morgan; her brother-in-law, Stuart Austin and his wife Dr. Melissa Austin, and her nephew Sean Austin; her sister-in-law, Marisa White, nieces Kelly White and Sebrina White, nephew Chris White, and several great nieces and nephews.

Jerry Austin's life exemplified a commitment to helping others and serving faithfully. She was active and beloved in churches wherever she resided. Her final years were full of love and fellowship with her church, her service and her family. Her grandchildren were a special delight. She will be sorely missed but we know she is with God.

A memorial service for Jerry Austin will be held on Saturday, November 4, 2023, at 11:00 a.m. at ChristChurch Presbyterian Church. The family will greet friends following the service.