Article published Friday, July 3, 2009 ANN HARROLD-DOERING-JONES, 1930-2009 Ex-Owens V.P. went to college at 30
FOSTORIA - Ann Harrold-Doering-Jones, who began college at 30 and became a vice president of what is now Owens Community College, died Tuesday at the Fostoria home of her daughter and son-in-law, Candy and Jeff Floriana.
She was 78 and had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and Alzheimer's disease.
She was vice president of general studies when she left Owens in 1977. She joined the Owens faculty in 1966, when she received a master's degree from Bowling Green State University. She became chairman of the general education department in 1969, after completing course requirements for a doctorate from BGSU. She received her PhD in 1974.
"My mom was raised by a teacher, and my mother really believed in the spirit of learning and being able to convey the joy of learning to her students and being able to express that through writing," daughter Jann Doering-Woodson said.
She was a 1948 graduate of Fostoria High School.
"She originally had intended to become a teacher," her daughter said. "She loved English and reading and the art of telling a good tale."
Mrs. Harrold-Doering-Jones married two weeks after high school graduation, had three children, and stayed home to care for them. She began college in 1961 at a BGSU branch in Fostoria. She switched to the main campus and received her bachelor's degree in 1964.
"She was pretty much a rarity in those days. Women didn't do those kinds of things," daughter Jann said, referring to her mother's enrollment as an older, female student.
At Owens, in those early years of modern-day feminism, she told the college she wanted to be known as "Ms." Then, in 1973, she decided to hyphenate her family name and her married name.
"A lot of liberated women are doing that, and I feel I have traded on my husband's name long enough," she told The Blade in 1973.
With her late start, she also had empathy for her Owens students, two-thirds of whom were older and worked.
"She was instrumental in getting continuing education classes started," daughter Jann said.
In 1973, Mrs. Harrold-Doering-Jones said: "I wonder what I would be doing today if I had not gone on to college - probably sitting home crying."
She added: "I wouldn't give up my years at home and the early years of caring for my children. I had the best of the whole thing. I got the middle of the pie."
Her grandfather founded the funeral home now called Harrold-Floriana and run by daughter Candy and son-in-law Jeff Floriana
Mrs. Harrold-Doering-Jones and her husband planned to run a restaurant and an antique store in Maine in retirement, and they did for a year before his death.
She later was a dean of instruction at Brainerd Community College in Minnesota and was executive dean of Ohio University's Chillicothe campus.
She and her second husband lived in the Florida Keys in the 1990s, and she taught at Florida Keys Community College.
After they returned to Fostoria, she taught a writers workshop at Kaubisch Memorial Library and led writing workshops online.
"What sums up Mom for me is she always told us you can be anything you wanted to be," daughter Jann said. "Every day for her was an adventure."
She was a member of Wesley United Methodist Church, Fostoria.
She married Howard O. "Jake" Doering, Jr., on June 14, 1948. He died April 15, 1978. She married Herbert E. Jones on May 21, 1982. He died May 2, 2004.
Surviving are her son, Howard O. "Hod" Doering III; daughters, Jann Doering-Woodson and Candy Floriana; five granddaughters, and 10 great-grandchildren.
Services will be at 11 a.m. today in the Harrold-Floriana Funeral Home, Fostoria. The family suggests tributes to Daybreak of Fostoria, which offers day care for people with Alzheimer's disease, or to Kaubisch Memorial Library, Fostoria. Permanent Link
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