Obituary of Katherine Elizabeth Swett McDonald

Funeral services for Katherine Elizabeth Swett McDonald, age 105, of Pine Bluff, Arkansas will be held 2:00 PM, Friday, December 18, 2020 from the Columbia chapel of Riser & Son Funeral Home with Bro. Billy Lane McClanahan officiating. Interment will follow in the Hebert Cemetery at Hebert, Louisiana. Visitation will be on Thursday, December 17, 2020 at the funeral home from 11:00 AM until 8:00 PM. Katherine Elizabeth Swett McDonald was born on October 1, 1915 at Hebert, LA to the union of her beloved parents, Colon Matthew Swett and Emma Delilah Childress Swett and passed from this life on Sunday, December 13, 2020 at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson following an extended illness. She was preceded in death by her husband of almost fifty years John McDonald. She was also preceded in death by her son, Jerome H. McDonald and two daughters: Mackie McDonald and Janette McDonald Hess. Mrs. McDonald was a lifelong friend of former Louisiana Governor Jimmie Davis and she was the object of affection in Governor Davis's mega hit, “You Are My Sunshine”. She was a singer songwriter-composer and had obtained a recording contract when she decided to be a mother to her children and be the type of mother that would be there for her children. Among her many talents she was an excellent seamstress, excelled in quilting and crochet. She was also an avid deer hunter and hunted until she was 93. She fished until she was 99. While living at Hebert she was a member of the Hebert United Methodist Church and after moving to Pine Bluff she attended the First Baptist Church of Pine Bluff. Left to cherish her memory are her children, Paul M. McDonald, Burleight J. McDonald and James A. McDonald all of Pine Bluff, Arkansas; her daughter, June V. McDonald of Brandon, Mississippi; her grandchildren she reared: Julet Katherine McDonald Toigo, Louis Wiley Sorrells and Dorothy L. McDonald; her grandchildren: Mackie Inez Cook, Marion Henry Johnson, Bertie Marie Sherman, Jerome S. McDonald, Karen Sue McDonald, Katherine “Tinsy” Guffey, Naomi Efird, Jessica Howell, Burleight J. McDonald, Jr., John T. McDonald, Brittany McDonald Craven, James A. McDonald, Jr., Kenneth McDonald and Michelle McDonald and a host of great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren.