Viola Baptiste Salone Thomas

Funeral Service for Viola Baptiste Salone Thomas will be Saturday, September 15, 2018, 11:00 AM at Greater New Hope Baptist Church, Baldwin, LA.

Visitation will be Friday, September 14, 2018, 7:00-9:00 PM at MK Dixon Funeral Home and Saturday, September 15, 2018, from 9:00 AM until the commencement of the funeral service at Greater New Hope Baptist Church.

She will be interred in Perpetual Park Mausoleum, Franklin, LA.

Viola Baptiste Salone Thomas will be remembered by those who knew and loved her as a warm, friendly, caring and generous Christian woman, mother, grandmother, daughter, sister, aunt, nurse and true and loyal friend.

Viola loved the Lord and her church and was a lifelong member, having accepted Christ and was baptized at an early age at Special Providence Baptist Church by her great Uncle Beecher Baptiste. Throughout the years she served in numerous roles at Special Providence under the pastorate of her father, Reverend Curley Everette Baptiste. Her church work continued at the Greater New Hope Baptist Church and extended well beyond her faithful attendance at Bible Study and Sunday Church Services. She gave generously of her time and resources, chaired various committees, sang in the choir, member of Sisters of Hope and was an untiring fundraiser for the church. She was not ashamed to testify to the goodness of and blessings she received from God.

Viola studied hard and following her primary and secondary education in St. Mary Parish Schools, launched her career as a Licensed Practical Nurse after graduating from the Youngs Memorial Vocational and Technical School. She loved her work as a nurse and treated her patients and their families with tender care and compassion while employed at Franklin Foundation Hospital, Franklin Health Care Center and as a private duty nurse before her retirement.

Viola was an astute businesswoman and Entrepreneur who treated her tenants with kindness and understanding often assisting them in navigating the social welfare, employment and health care systems.

She was revered by members of her family who are left to cherish with fondness, her home as the gathering place for fun, oral family history, and above all-great food. She loved a party and would often bring out her favorite musical selections for a spontaneous living room party. She was known within the family for her signature gumbo, red beans and rice, smothered okra, crawfish Etouffee, fried catfish all topped off with pecan pralines made by her friends. Many collected her recipes. Upon their visits, her many nieces and nephews from far and near, fully expected to be treated with a traditional crawfish boil and she did not disappoint.

A citizen of Franklin, Louisiana all of her adult life, she enjoyed living next to her late brother Earl who since their childhood hardly went a day without being in touch. Both were honored with the Broussard-Harris Committee Black Achievers Award
In March 2012. She was both civic minded and politically aware and never missed an opportunity to cast her vote.

Viola departed this life peacefully on Monday morning September 1O at her home among members of her family following a long illness. She was one of 10 childrenborn to Regina Jacquot Baptiste and Curley Everette Baptiste on November 11, 1931 in Ashton, Louisiana on the Baptiste family farm which had been purchased by her great grandfather, John Baptiste, Sr. in 1875 and on which her grandfather, John Jr, his siblings; her father, Curley, his siblings; her older siblings and several Baptiste cousins had been born. Most of her younger siblings were also born there.

Viola was united in matrimony in 1949 with Edward Salone who met with a tragic and untimely accidental death in 1954 just three months before the birth of their first and only child Julie was born. She later met and married Morgan Thomas and from this union two children Morgan Thomas, Jr and Lettye Thomas were born. Morgan also lovingly raised Julie as his own. Foster daughter LaTasha Dugas.

Viola was preceded in death by her parents, her first husband, Edward, her siblings Shirley Baptiste, Beverly Johnson, Phoebe LeBlanc, Geneva Pradia, Lillie Bourgeois, and Earl Baptiste, a grandson Anthony​ ​George grandparents John and Benedict Connor Baptiste, and Horace and Sedonia Colbert Jacquot. Foster son Felton Dugas.

She leaves to mourn her children, their father and her special friend and companion of many years, Allen Brooks.

Remaining to forever remember and cherish her legacy of love beside her children, are her granddaughters, Kourtney and, Kyrstyne Thomas, Chanel and Symone​ ​Price, great granddaughters Leila Michell Hollar and Morgan Alise George and great grandson Peyton Anthony George; her three sisters, Benedict Fleming of Oakland, California; Carrie Jackson of East Lansing, Michigan and Betty Guy of Dallas, Texas. Also remaining are her daughter-in-law Gwendolyn Thomas, her three brothers -in –law Charles Bourgeois of Houston, Texas, Maxie Jackson of East Lansing, Michigan and Ted Salone of New Iberia, Louisiana and a sister-in-law, Laura Monette Baptiste as well as a host of nieces, nephews and cousins.

The family finds consolation in and draws strength from the biblical verse:
"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away." Revelation 21:4

Viola fought a good fight. She finished her course and is at rest and peace with the Lord.

MK DIXON Funeral Home is in charge of final arrangements, 337-940-9253, 211 Main Street, Baldwin, LA 70514, www.mkdixonfh.com.