Jeanne Dunlop Epperson, 100, died peacefully of natural causes on November 16, 2000, at an extended care facility in Philadelphia. She celebrated her 100th birthday on February 6th of this year.
She was born in Salt Lake City, the fifth and youngest child of Charles M. and Emma Barret Dunlop. Her father, who graduated in engineering from the University of Illinois, was well known in Salt Lake where he was employed by the Salt Lake Street Railway Company. When she was eight months old, he was killed in a boiler explosion while working as a consultant for a gold dredging company in Idaho.
The family then moved to Logan where she attended local schools, including the Utah A & M, now Utah State University. In her early twenties she was employed in the Logan Office of the Utah Power & Light Co. She became an accomplished horsewoman and loved to ride through the backcountry of Utah and Idaho. Her skill behind the wheel on mountain roads earned her the nickname "Barney Oldfield".
On October 26, 1926, in Salt Lake she married Robert Betz Epperson. In 1933 Mr. Epperson was part of the team that worked with Ab Jenkins, who set a 24-hour speed and endurance record on the Bonneville Salt Flats driving a 12-cylinder Pierce Arrow touring car. Mr. Epperson later became national sales manager for an air-pollution control company headquartered in Philadelphia. He predeceased in 1980.
Mrs. Epperson was a woman of great vitality who in 1949 became one of the early women to receive a real estate broker's license. She remained active in the real estate business until the age of 83.
She belonged to St. John's Episcopal Church in Logan and subsequently to the Grace Episcopal Church in Philadelphia. She was a long-time member of the Daughters of the Nile and the Flourtown Women's Club of Philadelphia.
She is survived by one son, Robert Dunlop Epperson of Philadelphia; 16 nieces and nephews, 47 great-grand nieces and nephews, and six great-great-grand nieces and nephews.
She has been cremated in accordance with her wishes. Private services will be held later with burial at Mt. Olivet Cemetery in Salt Lake. The family suggests contributions in her name to your favorite charity.