Barbara Alice Timmons Yon

Barbara Alice Timmons Yon passed away peacefully surrounded by her family in Tallahassee, Florida, on April 12, 2024. Bobby, as she was affectionately known, was born at home in Quincy, Florida, on March 30, 1929, to Edmund Lane and Lucile Bailey Timmons. She joined her beloved one-year-old sister, Betty, and they grew up together as best friends on the family farm. Bobby had a very happy childhood and developed a great love and curiosity for the outdoors and enjoyed nature. She grew up very involved in her church, Gretna Baptist, and had a loving and adventurous home life centered around her large family. She had a lifelong passion for gardening and planting and growing many beautiful flowers in her yard that she enjoyed sharing with others.
Bobby graduated from Gadsden County High School in 1947 and then attended Anderson College (now Anderson University) in Anderson, South Carolina. She developed close lifelong friendships and enjoyed many trips back over the years for class reunions. She served as Anderson Student Body President and was crowned May Queen her sophomore year. In 1949, Bobby transferred to Florida State University, receiving a Bachelor of Science degree in Home Economics Education in 1951. She was a member of Alpha Gamma Delta sorority and remained very involved as an alumna throughout her life.
After graduation, she moved to Eustis, Florida, and began her work as a high school home economics teacher. After a year of teaching, she moved back to Tallahassee and married her college sweetheart, Bill Yon, in Gretna on August 1, 1952. Bobby and Bill made their home in Tallahassee, enjoying sixty-two years of marriage before Bill's death in 2015. They raised two daughters in a loving Christian home centered around faith and family. Bobby enjoyed a wonderful thirty-six-year career with Florida State University and retired in 1991 as an academic administrator. She was honored as Distinguished Alumni of the College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences in 1991.
Bobby was a very active member of First Baptist Church, Tallahassee, for seventy years. She and Bill began attending the first of many First Baptist Sunday School classes after they married and developed many very close lifelong friendships along the way. She was Director of Girl's Auxiliary for several years while her daughters were growing up, and she taught Bible study in children's Training Union classes. Bobby and Bill helped organize and start a new First Baptist Singles Sunday School class. They opened their home often for meals and fellowship. Bobby was a great hostess, and she and Bill enjoyed entertaining and sharing their home with others. She also remained an active member of the Tallahassee Junior League.
After Bobby retired in 1991, she and Bill enjoyed working on the family farm in Quincy, and she was able to spend more time with her parents and sister and help care for them. She loved visiting with all of her large extended family, always sharing delicious meals she had prepared and fresh cut flowers she had arranged. She and Bill took several trips, but their greatest joy was visiting their children and welcoming three grandchildren and a precious great-grandson. Bobby was affectionately known to them as "Baba." Time with Baba was always fun and full of adventure. She taught them many life lessons through setting a wonderful example of love, faith, kindness, joy, generosity, having a positive attitude, helping others, loving nature, and most importantly about having a relationship with God. She always said that she did not worry about anything but rather prayed about everything. Bobby was a beacon of love and light to everyone she met. She is at peace and enjoying her home now in Heaven with her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Bobby's loving legacy is left to her children, Jane Bachtler (Bill), Tallahassee, Julie Horton (Rick), Columbia, SC; grandchildren, Bob Bachtler (Joanna), Los Angeles, CA, Beth Risley, Santa Monica, CA, and Jenny Horton, Chapel Hill, NC; and great-grandson, Carson William Bachtler. She is also survived by nieces and nephews, Barbara Craig (Mike), Lane Mahaffey (Janice), Beth Frith, Lynn Skelton (Brad), Ken Yon (Ellen), and Nancy Johnson (Jeff), as well as many great-nieces and nephews, and cousins.
Bobby was predeceased by her loving husband, Bill Yon; parents, Lane and Lucile Bailey Timmons; sister, Betty Timmons Mahaffey, and brother-in-law, Bascom Mahaffey; mother- and father-in-law, Bill and Lillie Mae Parrish Yon; brother- and sister-in-law, Terrell and Norma Yon; nephew, Terry Yon; and many beloved aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends.
Visitation will be Friday, April 26, from 5–6:30 p.m. at Bevis Funeral Home, 200 John Knox Road, Tallahassee. A memorial service celebrating Bobby's life will be Saturday, April 27, at 11:00 a.m. in the sanctuary of First Baptist Church of Tallahassee. A graveside service will follow at 1:00 p.m. at Sunny Dell Cemetery on Solomon Dairy Road in Gretna, Florida.
Memorials may be made to Sunny Dell Cemetery, mailing address 815 Sunset Drive, Quincy, FL 32351; First Baptist Church of Tallahassee, 108 West College Avenue, Tallahassee, FL 32301; and Big Bend Hospice, 1723 Mahan Center Blvd., Tallahassee, FL 32308.
Rocky Bevis and Kelly Barber of Bevis Funeral Home (850-385-2193 or www.bevisfh.com) are assisting the family with their arrangements.