June Esmon

Born on October 2, 1927

Departed on December 5, 2019 and resided in Nashville, Tennessee

June Pearl Esmon, 92, died Thursday, Dec. 5, 2019, at The Meadows in Bellevue, TN.

A visitation will be held 3-5 p.m. on Sunday, December 8, 2019 at the Harpeth Hills Memory Gardens, 9090 Highway 100, Nashville, TN, with services at 11:30 a.m. on Monday, also at the funeral home.
June was preceded in death by her parents, Earl and Grace (Samara Downey) Shouse, and her husband, Lloyd Esmon.

June was born in Centralia, IL, on Oct. 2, 1927. When she was very young, her family moved to the village of Bluford, IL, a few miles to the southeast. There she met and married her childhood sweetheart, Lloyd.

She graduated high school in 1945 as one of just six girls in her graduating class. (All of the boys from her class had gone off to war or to work on the railroad.) She attended Southern Illinois University-Carbondale for two years before marrying Lloyd on April 11, 1948.

For the next few years they lived in several Southern Illinois towns, including Mount Vernon and Dix, and then Lloyd became principal of the high school where they both had graduated. June worked in various office jobs at banks, retail stores and auto supply companies.

A son, Dwight, was born in 1950 and a daughter, Janet, in 1959.

In 1961, Lloyd took a job with the American Newspaper Publishers Association in New York City, and the family moved to Midland Park, NJ. going from a town of about 500 people to a metropolitan area of more than 13 million. In 1964, he accepted a job with the Miami Herald, and the family moved to sunny south Florida, which June dearly loved. In 1969, Lloyd took a job with the Newspaper Printing Corp., the joint operating agreement for the Nashville Banner and The Tennessean, and the family moved to Nashville.

June was diagnosed with what was then called manic depression in 1971. June was always very open about her mental health struggles, and friends would sometimes seek her out when they or a loved one were dealing with depression or what is now known as bipolar disorder to seek advice or talk about issues that she'd experienced over the years.

Lloyd and June spent many years traveling with friends to almost every state including Hawaii and Alaska, and they took a memorable trip with a church group to Egypt, Israel, Greece and Italy. They also enjoyed dining out and became friends with the staffs at a number of Nashville restaurants over the years.

June loved cats, and her favorite was a disagreeable black Persian named Alexander. She also loved ordering things from mail order catalogs, and she always went along with whatever Lloyd wanted to do.

They were both very active members of the Bellevue Church of Christ for well over 45 years.

She is survived by her son, Dwight Esmon and wife Sandi, of Bonita Springs, FL, her daughter, Janet Shouse and husband John, of Franklin, TN, and three adored grandchildren, Emma Shouse Garton, Evan Shouse and Brendan Shouse. (There is a Shouse connection between June and John, but it required ancestral research going back to the early 1700's.)
In lieu of flowers, gifts may be made to the Arc Tennessee, 545 Mainstream Drive, Suite 100, Nashville, TN 37228-1213.