RICHMOND,
Janice Marie Holcombe, departed this world on Saturday, January 27, 2018 with her beloved husband of almost sixty-five years and her family by her side at her home after a short illness.
She was born in Trenton, New Jersey to Ruth and Herbert Holcombe. They lived in a company town of Roebling, NJ, where her father worked. They later moved to Trenton when Janice was age 3. Her family lived in an old Victoria home and took in boarders during the Depression years. Consequently, throughout her life, she opened her home to students, international visitors, and other guests.
She was an excellent student and editor of her high school newspaper. She attended Wellesley College, her beloved Alma Mater, graduating in June, 1953. That same June she married Roland Whan Richmond, whom she had met working at a restaurant at Seaside Park on the Jersey shore two years earlier. Together they spent sixty-five years raising a family, traveling the world, and enjoying the arts–orchestra, opera, theater and lectures.
Janice had a variety of careers. She started off as a social worker and school teacher when her four children were young. Later she was Intake Director at Brooklawn Children’sHome (now Uspiritus) before having her midlife calling to attend seminary. She graduated from Louisville Presbyterian Seminary in 1983 and was ordained as a United Church of Christ Minister. Reverend Richmond served both as a chaplain in hospitals and as a pastor at three churches–St Johns UCC in Madison, Indiana and Christ Evangelical UCC and St John UCC in Louisville. She also served with Roland twice as a short-term missionary in Vellore and Ludhiana, India in the late 1990s.
Some of her other joys were being a member of the AAUW (a literature and gourmet group), the Monday Afternoon Club, and the Highlands Mothers Club where she became a Mary Lee girl (50-yearmember in 2014). She was a 55-year member of Lynnhurst United Church of Christ and founded the JOY Sunday school class there before beginning her ministry.
Janice loved being busy, planning, traveling and helping others. Her greatest love was her husband and traveling partner Roland (Rich or Doc) of almost sixty-five years.
She is survived by her husband Roland; her three sons: Kenneth (Debby), Donald (Beverly), William (Victoria) and her daughter Kathryn Matheny (Richard);eight grandchildren: Sara, Rebecca, Leah, Matthew, Luke, Steven, Elizabeth, and Christopher; two great grandchildren: Alex and Sam; her sister Doris Holcombe Boyle from New Jersey; two special honorary daughters Que Pham and Connie Soeder; and numerous cousins, nieces and nephews.
Please honor Janice’s memory by a gift to the church or organization from which you knew her best or by a donation to Wellesley College in Massachusetts.
A celebration of life will be held at noon on Saturday, February 3, 2018 at Highlands Funeral Home, 3331 Taylorsville Rd. with burial to follow at Cave Hill Cemetery. Friends may visit with family from 2-6 p.m. Friday at Highlands.