[Spark 1877] ClassNotFoundException when loading RDD with serialized objects

Updated version of #821

Author: Tathagata Das <tathagata.das1565@gmail.com>
Author: Ghidireac <bogdang@u448a5b0a73d45358d94a.ant.amazon.com>

Closes #835 from tdas/SPARK-1877 and squashes the following commits:

f346f71 [Tathagata Das] Addressed Patrick's comments.
fee0c5d [Ghidireac] SPARK-1877: ClassNotFoundException when loading RDD with serialized objects

(cherry picked from commit 52eb54d02403a3c37d84b9da7cc1cdb261048cf8)
Signed-off-by: Tathagata Das <tathagata.das1565@gmail.com>
Updated CHANGES.txt
Revert "[maven-release-plugin] prepare for next development iteration"

This reverts commit f8e611955096c5c1c7db5764b9d2851b1d295f0d.
Revert "[maven-release-plugin] prepare release v1.0.0-rc9"

This reverts commit 920f947eb5a22a679c0c3186cf69ee75f6041c75.