For their decades of service to others, Lydia and Dan Jones of Hazlehurst, Mississippi, will be honored at the University of Mississippi on April 4 with the Ole Miss Women’s Council for Philanthropy 2025 Legacy Award.
The Legacy Award ceremony will begin at 7 p.m. at The Inn at Ole Miss. A ticketed event, members of the community are invited to attend. Presenting sponsor for the event is mTrade and additional sponsorships are available.
The award is presented annually to those whose lives exemplify the values and tenets of the OMWC: philanthropy, scholarship, leadership and mentorship.
“The Ole Miss Women’s Council selected Lydia and Dan Jones to receive the 2025 Legacy Award in recognition of their unwavering dedication to service, leadership and philanthropy, as well as for serving as mentors and creating opportunities for future generations,” said OMWC member Candie Simmons.
Lydia Jones has dedicated countless hours to her communities. Some of her volunteer leadership positions include president of the Junior Auxiliary of Laurel, Mississippi; an officer with the Mississippi State Medical Association Auxiliary; a volunteer with the Clinton, Mississippi, Public Schools; president of the Junior Civic League of Clinton and serving in a leadership position from 1998-2001; and a volunteer with the Hazlehurst City Schools Barksdale Reading Program and Hazlehurst Chamber of Commerce Board.
Dan Jones, M.D., served as the 16th chancellor of the University of Mississippi from 2009 to 2015. Before leading as chancellor, he was vice chancellor for health affairs and dean of the University of Mississippi School of Medicine. The example Jones set by dedicating so much of his time and energy to those in need inspired UM faculty, staff and students to contribute thousands of hours to community service.
“Our faith compels us to live a life of service to others and in that service, we find our greatest joy,” Dan Jones said.
When they met as freshmen at Mississippi College, Lydia and Dan Jones found that while they had many differences, they soon realized they had far more in common.
“As a couple, we are as different as night and day — except for our values,” Lydia Jones said.
They were both raised in Christian homes and had fathers who were Baptist pastors.
“Our parents exhibited for us the importance of a life of service, including the responsibility and the joy of that life,” Dan Jones said. “It is our fathers, though, we credit with having the largest influence in our lives. They were the first to see leadership qualities in us and they also showed us the way to love others, even those not acting in a loving way toward us.”
As the couple grew older, their path became clear.
“As teens, through our church relationships, each of us felt like part of that service life would be lived out in mission service in another country,” Lydia Jones said. “Once we became a couple, we simply began living the life together that we each had committed to separately.”
In 1985, Lydia and Dan Jones fully embraced the call to international missions, moving with their children, Jason and Jennifer, to Pusan, South Korea, where they served for seven years.
“Dan’s role as a medical missionary included a broad range of opportunities, including teaching medical students and residents,” she said. “He also founded and led the first hypertension specialty clinic in South Korea and spent much of his time practicing ‘shade tree’ medicine in remote and poor farming villages.”
“At the same time, Lydia served as school superintendent for the children of about 100 missionary families,” Dan Jones said. “She traveled the country evaluating and ensuring every student had the educational experience they needed, whether learning in an international school, a small community school, homeschooling or correspondence school.”
Their work included involvement with the Southern Baptist Convention International Mission Board, volunteering with the Leprosy Colony Clinic, and attending to a wide variety of medical missionary needs. Lydia Jones, in addition to serving as an educational administrator for South Korean missionary families for the International Mission Board, served as a member of the Pusan International School Board.
After returning to Mississippi and joining the medical school faculty, Dan Jones was a medical education consultant to medical schools in North Korea.
The couple expressed deep appreciation to the University of Mississippi Medical Center for providing Dan Jones with the exceptional medical training that prepared him to take on career opportunities he never imagined possible and to serve as UM chancellor.
A respected academician, administrator and physician, Jones also was the Herbert G. Langford Professor of Medicine at UMMC. He served as national president of the American Heart Association and was named one of the “Best Doctors in America” from 1996 to 2008.
For most of his career, his patient care, teaching and research have focused on hypertension and prevention of cardiovascular disease. He was the first principal investigator for UMMC’s participation in the landmark Jackson Heart Study, a National Institutes of Health-sponsored population study focused on cardiovascular disease in African Americans.
A Master of the American College of Physicians, Jones is certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine and is designated as a specialist in clinical hypertension by the American Society of Hypertension Specialists. He also was a member of AHA’s Council for High Blood Pressure Research and served the association as national spokesperson on high blood pressure.
The couple is grateful to the Women’s Council for honoring them.
“We hope our legacies will be lives of service to others as demonstrated to us by our parents and continued through the lives of our children and grandchildren,” Lydia Jones said.
The Presenting Sponsor for the 2025 Legacy Award event, mTrade, noted it was pleased to support this celebration of Lydia and Dan Jones.
“mTrade is proud to be a part of honoring the ongoing legacy of Lydia and Dan Jones,” mTrade commented. “Their dedication and compassion over the years has been truly extraordinary.”
Past Legacy Award honorees include Donna and Jim Barksdale, Jennifer Gillom and Peggie Gillom-Granderson, Ruth and Dr. Arthur C. Guyton, Dr. Gerald M. “Doc” Hollingsworth, Chancellor Emeritus Robert C. Khayat, Olivia Manning, Charles Overby, Ambassador John N. Palmer, Dolly Parton, Leigh Anne Touhy, Elise and Gov. William Winter, and, most recently, business-partner brothers, Tommy and Jim Duff.
For more information about the Legacy Award and sponsorship opportunities available for the Legacy Award ceremony, as well as details about the Ole Miss Women’s Council, contact Suzanne Helveston, program director, at shelveston@olemiss.edu or 662-915-2956.
By Jonathan Scott/UM Development