Anna Lee Kenyon

Mom was a strong lil’ pioneer born in Calipatria, CA on 7 September 1924, before the Great Depression. She was lucky to be part of a large and loving family of 10 girls, 3 boys, and the sweetest parents Charlie and Nelda Rowe. During the Depression of 1929, when jobs were few and there was a shortage of food, the family traveled and worked all over California. Grandpa (Charlie Rowe) claimed a gold mine in Hayfork, CA on the Trinity River, where the family shared love, laughter, fishing, and gold panning every day. In 1942, before graduating from the Mission High School in San Francisco, mom started her waitressing career at Johnson’s Tamale Grotto, where she proved to be a superb waitress, always giving her customers the best service with a beautiful smile. In later years she enjoyed the challenging career as a CNA, where she always gave her patients compassionate care. Her happy memories of hard work and people pleasing service always gave her the satisfaction and accomplishment of a long and happy, industrious life. One of the joys of life is having children who share their love, laughter, and smiles. Mom’s life was complete with 6 beautiful children: Judy, Cheryl, Barbara, Bill, Johnny, and Karen. Their love for her and desire to make her happy gave her the opportunities to travel on 1st class vacations from Hawaii to the island of Grenada in the Caribbean. Best of all was ice fishing in Minnesota to fishing on a house boat on the Sacramento River to the Baja of Mexico with dolphins swimming nearby. She was always catching the first and the biggest fish. Gold panning again in the Gold Country of Northern California and still finding nuggets gave her such a renewed memory of panning for gold long ago with her sisters Reta and Patty, who are both now in their 90s.

The Lord blessed her with a long life and never left her side from the first day to the last. Our strength in the future will come from knowing we’ll be together again, and the time apart will be like the blink of an eye. We thank Jesus for His Mercy.

Cherishing her memory are her 2 sisters Reta Griffith and Patricia McClain (Lou); her 6 children: Judy D. Campbell of Tucson, AZ; Cheryl Noriega (Ronald) of Sacramento, CA; Barbara Brown of Tucson, AZ; Bill Brown (Dawn) of Eagle Bend, MN; John Brown (Corrina) of Brandt, SD; Karen Kenyon (Lisa) of Santa Rosa, CA; and 17 grandchildren, 32 great grandchildren, and 2 great great grandchildren.

Anna was preceded in death by her parents Charlie and Nelda Rowe; 7 sisters: Margaret Waltimeyer, Nelda Knapp, Olive Cummins, Grace Griffith-Guzman, Ruth Mae Lyons, Ida Leyer, Mary Rowe; 3 brothers: George Leyer, Bill Leyer, and James Rowe; and 2 grandchildren: Kris Anne Lorenzen and Gary Edwin Lorenzen, Jr.