Living a Legacy: Juanita Jones
BY TRISTA HAVNER
PHOTOS BY TRUNETTA ATWATER
FEATURED IN VOL 7, ISSUE 2: Legacy
I try to make a habit of meeting one new person every month. After I got married and decided to stay in Jackson despite my longing to go anywhere and do anything but stay in my hometown, a wise mentor gifted me with this advice: meet someone new from Jackson every month. She reminded me that there were still so many corners of my city that I did not fully know or understand, and opening myself up to the opportunity of a new relationship each month could satisfy my longing for newness and for adventure. She even argued that if I made myself vulnerable to new people and listened to their stories, I might actually discover things about myself previously unknown. I received her advice and, as a young twenty-something who did not need to be told how to live, I put those good words on the shelf.
It has only been in the last few years that I have learned that her wisdom was profound, and I did not need to waste any more time. She was not wrong. Meeting new people, listening to their stories and entering into their spaces, has changed me. It has made me softer, and I have been captivated many times over by stories. But this month, the woman I was honored to meet dazzled me. I asked questions and sat in awe of the woman across from me. I hung on her every word and with good reason. This woman is, perhaps, the most interesting person I have ever met.
When I set up an interview with Juanita Jones, I had never met her in person. We had a very brief conversation over the phone and I had seen her from afar at a few events, but I had never actually spoken to her face-to-face. I had been keeping up with the work she was doing, but I did not know her. So when I pulled up to Keep My Hood Good, I had no idea who to expect. Would she be open and receptive to my probing questions? Would she even want to tell her story? All of those fears were alleviated the moment she opened the door and let me in. Her warmth and hospitality immediately put me at ease, and I felt strangely comfortable with her.
When you walk in the door of the Keep My Hood Good building, you are greeted with a wall covered in framed photographs of smiling children. I had only gotten a few steps in the building before she was telling me stories of students who had overcome and succeeded. She beamed as she told me about how one student had graduated high school and chosen to enlist in the military and was thriving. She told of another student who was preparing to train for the police academy and one young boy who showed skills as an entrepreneur. There had to be fifty photos on that wall and she knew each one by name and could tell each story.
I followed her around the building as she showed me designated areas for structured classes and meetings, a lounge area to play board games and cards and chess, comfortable chairs where students can hone their reading skills, computers to work on college and job applications, a weight room and an outdoor area to play basketball and grill. There was also a space for students to receive counsel and a clothes closet. Everything was tidy and orderly and I followed her in utter amazement around the various rooms she has so thoughtfully and carefully constructed. Juanita has not only created a space for children to come and be known and cared for, she has created a home. As we sat down to talk about what led her to this moment, all of the interview questions I had prepared did not feel like they could hold the magnitude of this place and her story.
Let’s be clear — Keep My Hood Good is incredible. What Juanita has managed to create, almost completely on her own, is remarkable. I would be remiss if I did not highlight Keep My Hood Good and Juanita’s work, but she is not her work. She is so much more than the immeasurable tasks she is somehow able to do in a day or a week or a month. She is dazzling.
Juanita says she was born in El Paso, Texas, was raised in McKenzie, Tennessee, but grew up in Oceanside, California. Her father was a retired Army veteran and she was raised with a familial support system that instilled in her the values of respect for oneself and for others. Her grandmother was a respected matriarch in the community and guided her (and the other children in her community) with discipline and care. Overall, Juanita described that her family taught her that love for God, others and oneself were paramount to being at peace. She grew up as a shy introvert who preferred to be alone and outdoors than with her peers. She fished and climbed and rode dirt bikes and craved adventure and longed to experience freedom. In fact, she longed to travel to California and bump into Tupac, who she adored. She said despite being shy, she learned that she had a voice and she needed to speak. She needed to experience everything she could.
Juanita was part of the high school band in McKenzie, Tennessee, and was a majorette who was highly skilled in baton twirling. And that talent earned her a scholarship to the University of Tennessee at Martin to twirl the baton with their band. She twirled everything, even fire. She was on track to graduate and was only a few hours short when she enlisted in the army, eventually settling on the Marine Corps. She enlisted for six years and was afforded the opportunity to travel, which she so desperately longed to do. She moved from the Carolinas to Hawaii to California (where she, sadly, did not meet Tupac). At the end of her enlistment period, she returned to McKenzie and became a firefighter before eventually settling into an office job that brought her to Jackson, where she managed a branch and worked in other offices for nearly eight years.
But an office could not hold the interest of a woman like Juanita. Her curiosity and zest for adventure could not be contained, so in 2006 she decided it was time to do something new. She founded a transportation business, Jay and Jai, to transport children to and from daycares. This transportation service would be the catalyst for Keep My Hood Good.
The process of gaining permits to drive a bus to transport children was not an easy one, and Juanita faced opposition at every turn. But, true to her form, every “no” was a motivator to press on and in. She earned the certifications and permits to do her work and began to build bridges with the people in her community who needed her services. She picked children up from laundromats and apartments and transported them to the daycares in East Jackson. Juanita was always observing, always listening, always assessing. She realized that the greatest need in the community was a place for older children to have a community, a family of people who believed in their success and loved them.
In 2014, Juanita turned what was a bi-weekly meeting in Lincoln Courts into a full-time program. Keep My Hood Good began meeting at the YMCA prior to its closing, and then in T.R. White Sportsplex during the school year. The program ran from 3-6 in the afternoons and summers, providing students transportation to and from the program. Finally, in 2017, Keep My Hood Good moved into their current location. But honestly, if you have been in the building, you would never know that this is a new location. It feels comfortable and warm and like a home. And that is intentional, as is most everything Juanita does. She set the program up to give children a chance to learn skills and self-discipline, to give them a place to belong and receive and extend love for themselves and to their peers. Through structure and guidance, she hopes to create a framework for success that has the power to break generational poverty and propel these students into opportunities for lifelong growth. She has chosen hard work. The work of change is always tough and often thankless, but Juanita keeps showing up to do that work.
After hearing the story of Keep My Hood Good, I just assumed that there was a large team of people doing the daily work to keep the program running. I assumed wrong. Juanita transports the kids. Juanita oversees the daily meetings. Juanita counsels with the children when they need one-on-one guidance. Juanita even does all of the paperwork that a non-profit depends on to continue serving the community. She is the backbone of the program. She is the hands and feet of the program. She does have a board and people who help her along the way, but she is the constant. Whatever legacy is left, whatever precedent that Keep My Hood Good sets for the community, that is the work of Juanita Jones.
The legacy that the program is creating is a living, breathing entity all its own. She is teaching the children to show respect, to love themselves and then to love their community. That is a simple yet profound agent of change that could course through our city with tenacity and really make a difference. This is not a weak “love yourself and others” performative offering, but it is a true legacy that can and will change actual people if it is maintained. Juanita hopes that the work of Keep My Hood Good spans racial and generational and socio-economic disparities because love has the power to do that.
As we were wrapping up our time together (and I really could have stayed and listened to Juanita tell stories all afternoon), I asked her what she hoped her personal legacy would be. I wanted to know what she hoped to accomplish, what she wanted people to remember about her specifically. She really struggled to answer that question and I wasn’t surprised. She has fully committed herself to others and, when people are engaged in such consuming and selfless work, they often cannot articulate their own needs and desires. She is the eye of a storm she has created. A big, swirling, beautiful storm. She is the safe space in the middle of the chaos, and the demands of the work she has committed to are spinning around her and she cannot see past the wall of to-dos and paperwork.
She cannot envision the legacy she is creating. But I can. I can see her from above and all around, and the storm that she has created is going to keep swirling and drawing in the people of this community. This beautiful, powerful, unstoppable storm is Juanita’s legacy. It is alive and here and is changing people’s lives. She has created something, born from her tenacious spirit, that is wild itself. Refusing to be denied, pressing into her neighborhood and our city at large, offering safety but beckoning us all to enter into the storm of personal growth that will lead to communal change. That is the legacy Juanita Jones has impressed on her community and now on me, and we will not be the same.
Learn more about Keep My Hood Good at keepmyhoodgood.org.
Trista Havner is a born and raised Jackson girl, a mom, wife, and small business owner. She and her husband, Charlie, have a charming local family business and are passionate about the history there. Trista can be found putting together frames in her family’s shop or lettering anything that will hold still. Her love for home grows daily, and she is passionate about being an agent of growth and positive change in her beloved Hub City.
