Sunday, November 4, 2018

Orphan Photo Project: a real orphan Inez Faye Chambers of Quenemo, Osage County, Kansas

Inez Faye Chambers 
In the days before antibiotics children were often left orphans, or in this case a semi-orphan. 
Now for the back story:
William Chambers married Ida May Eddington on August 19th, 1894 in Rantoul, Kansas where Mr. Chambers was working with the railroad.  They soon added two daughters to their family; Inez Fay Chambers (13 Nov 1895 - 13 Apr 1974) and Frances Irene Chambers (4 Mar 1898 - 2 Apr 1917).

 In the fall of  1901, William and Inez Chambers moved west to Colorado to see if a change in climate would improve her condition. There was no improvement, so the family Ida May and her two daughters back to Quenemo, Osage County, Kansas where she died soon after.

After their mother's death, the Inez and Irene were adopted by their Aunt Nancy Jane Edington Mikesell Spencer, the wife of Charles Spencer.  Nancy Janes' two sons by her first marriage to Fielding Mikesell;  Harry and Art became their "older brothers". 

 On the 11 Sep 1913, seventeen-year-old Inez Chambers married Willard Edmands in Minneapolis, Kansas.  This couple never had children.  Irene Chambers, was in ill health, probably from the scourge of the time tuberculosis. She died at her sister's home on 2 April 1917 at age 19.  Her father William Chambers was alive at the time.  It is unknown how much interaction the girls had with their father William Chambers, as he is not mentioned in the newspapers. In 1918, a year later Inez lost her Aunt Nancy Spencer. Inez and her husband Willard Edmands continued to live in Ottawa County until his death on 29 May 1960 in Minneapolis, Ottawa County, KS.  Inez Faye Chambers Edmands died 13 April 1974 and is buried in Minneapolis, Kansas next to her husband. At this writing, there is no further evidence of William Chambers, father of Inez and Irene Chambers.