Irene Campbell Stoianovsky
1895 – 1996?
What can I say about my mother’s cousin Irene Boyne Campbell Stoianovsky? She, along with my family’s friend, Graham Cranston, are the two people in my life other than my wife and parents, and children, who has had the most impact on who I am.
Cousin Irene was not only a cosmopolitan woman, but also a bohemian. She was comfortable and open in any situation in any place in the world with whom ever she met.
She is like a dish in a gourmet meal with many layers of taste and substance. The first is that she was a Christian Scientist, and grounded in the gift of acceptance, reconciliation and redemption. The second is that she had a complete commitment to her family and friends. She laterally reached out to ingather the members of her family and her friends through her letters and phone calls, and conversations. She truly loved her family and those around her. Thirdly, she had an insatiable curiosity about people and ideas, and a thirst for learning. Lastly, she was a self-contained person. Through virtually all of her life she moved without much support and love from her parents, other family, and friends. Her inspiration and motivation came from a gift that she held within herself.
Irene grew up in a family of dysfunction and hardship. Her mother divorced her father at an early age and remarried. She had to move frequently, and live with her grandparents much of the time, and, in other times, board with friends.
She suffered two life-threatening illnesses as a child.
She not only suffered hardship, but she imposed hardship on her children by requiring them to live with family friends when Irene couldn’t directly support them. She married a man who she served as an undying faithful wife, even though most of their marriage, he live and worked abroad. She always referred to him in a formal way as John Campbell, as opposed to “my husband, John.”
She struggled to maintain continuity as she moved through elementary and high school, although she was required to move frequently. After high school graduation in Bakersfield, she secured a job as a teacher in the San Joaquin Valley. and, subsequently, attended U.C. Berkley for two years before she had to withdraw from illness. Later, while teaching in the L.A. School District, she attended and graduated from U.S.C. in 1933. Doing all of this while her husband was in South America and her children were boarding outside of her home.
Here is Irene celebrating her 99th birthday in Canoga Park.
Irene and “the Admiral” who was the son of a sailing friend
of Irene’s first husband, John Campbell, on Irene’s 99th birthday.
Irene blessed her family members and ancestors by being a prolific letter writer. The following transcriptions of her letters to me not only provided direct information about her own life, but she also provided invaluable information about my mother and her parents.
In some ways, Irene knew my Grandmother Lola more intimately than my mother and her siblings. Irene, for example, used to refer to Lola as her "sister" rather than her aunt because they were close in age, and spent time together.
The following are transcripts of the original handwritten letters that Irene sent to me:
December, 1989
Dear Jim and Pat,
Your letter of August 27th was a great joy, and I congratulate you both on fine jobs.
Since Christmas is a family time I will answer your question abous about the common branch of our family tree. True, your mother’s parents were my dear Aunt Lola and Uncle Wesley. From their marriage in --- I believe 1903, I was often a happy visitor in their home. John Campbell and I visited them on our honeymoon. I have a picture of us with your mother and Marden.
I lived with my Grandmother, Ella Sayles from age 3 to 7, and Lola cared for me a great deal. But Joseph Hasman was Grandma Ella’s third husband, and Lola was not his daughter. She was born Lola M. Kirk, and had a living sister, Cora Kirk Boyne Burwell, and an uncle, Fred Kirk, both of whom I knew well. The Kirks were from Missouri and were some relation to Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. and tried to contact Gramdma Ella when the R’s came to live in S.F.
So, Mr. Hasman was Lola’s stepfather. We always called him Mister. He was born in Czechoslovakia, and came to the U.S. when he was 4. I met a sister once, and he had 3 sons, no blood relations.
Grandma Ella’s first husband was Joseph Lambert who died before my mother was born. He was a student at Hastings Law School. Grandfather and Grandmother Sayles raised my mother until her marriage to Arthur Boyne in 1887.
Your Aunt Cora married his brother and was widowed. Later she married Charles Berwell. Their only child died in 1913. Grandfather and Grandmother Sayles came to California in a covered wagon in 1850. They already had about five children. Grandma Ella was the only one born in California --- in Grizzly Flat, Amador County. [Great] Grandfather Thomas Sayles was born in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. in 1814. His mother’s maiden name was Scobie. I was told she was a descendent of French Jugonots who fled to Holland, married Hollanders, and came to the New Holland settlement of New York. I do not know if there is any connection with a Col. Thos. Sayles who came to be [?] a Baptist stronghold, but Grandfather was a strong Baptist and a pillar in the Church in Sacramento. His wife, Martha Sanford was born on a farm where Dayton, Ohio now stands. Born in July (as was he) in 1816. I had a friend who was also a Sanford descendant and studied the family tree. [They] settled in Ohio, the Carolinas, and W. Va. Thomas and Martha met in W. Va. She first saw him sitting on a tree stump eating an apple. He was once a school teacher, later a nurseryman. He planted the first trees at the Sacramento State Capital.
One of my pleasantest memories was seeing the smiles on the faces of Lola, Cora, and Blanch (my mother) when they met at Meg’s house in L.A. and were taken by Lee Howe (Lola’s second husband) to see their son Bob Howe in the San Fernando Valley. I have a yearly correspondence with him.
Thank you for typing your letter. I hope you can read this. My hand shakes so badly, I can hardly write.
Do tell me about Tom, Andy and your dear selves.
Lovingly,
Irene Stoianofsky
P.S. The tartan Christmas tree whimsy says that my name became Campbell in 1918. [That was the year she was married.]
May 19, 1994
San Francisco
Dear Ones,
I am sorry you had a change in plans so that I did not see you in April.
This is just to let you know that I was put in the nursing unit in January, I think with sepulchral cough, and have just recovered.
But Juliet, John’s only child, and Gail, Meg’s oldest, decided that I should go south, where Juliet had found a nursing home near her so she can see me every day.
Perhaps you will come see me there. You know that Juliet is married to a Taiwanese former naval officer, now an engineer at Rocketdyne who is a graduate of the Univ. of Oklahome.
Love from,
Irene
June 12, 1994
20608 Runnymeade
Canoga Park, CA 91206
Dear Jim and Pat,
Juliet sent me your letter to answer as her parents in law arrived from Taiwan yesterday and she could not see me as usual.
Later the mother in law a Taiwanese, and the father in law, a Chinese who came to Taiwan with Chiang Kai Chek will come to see me. I have already met them several times.
I am sure you and Juliet and Ray would find much in common ¬ if you are not prejudiced against Chinese. She is my favorite grandchild, is my deceased son's daughter, is a graduate of U.C.L.A., a teacher, etc. Ray is a successful engineer after graduating from Univ. of Oklahoma and they have a son aged almost 7[?] in July.
They all have visited the relatives in Taiwan and three years ago when China was opened to Americans Ray is an American citizen they visited those who are left in China.
Juliet made me a book depicting their visit, including their walk on the Great Wall. It was almost as good as a trip.
When I was in Hong Kong, all I was able to do was to look down on China from Victoria Heights.
There were many Chinese in Sacramento where I was born, and when I went to live with Grandma Hasmand, her husband whom I called "Mister", afterwards a name the whole family adopted, he had a Chinese visitor who often called and took me on his lap. He called me "Ileen" be cause he could not say "Irene".
Mister was born a Czech and was unprejudiced. He was Grandmothers Hasmarid's third husband. The first was Joseph Lambert who died when he was a student in Hastings Law School in S.F. My mother, known to you as Aunt Blanche, was a posthumous child. After her divorce from my father, she married Riefus Robert Lucas, by whom she had my half sister Corabel and my half brother Bob.
Your mother and Bob were engaged for a while and she wore his fraternity pin but your grandfather, my uncle, disapproved because of horoscope readings. So they broke it off. I was sorry.
Your grandmother, my Aunt Lola, who was my favorite aunt, also lived in the big house and store in Elk Grove when I was there. She left at eighteen or so to live with her brother, Fred Kirk and his wife, and her sister, Cora Kirk Boyne [?] in Oakland. I lived there also for a few months until my mother married my step father, R.R. Lucas. I was in third grade in an Oakland school when we left for Ukiab in 1902. I lived there through June 1910 when I went to my mother and stepfather who had established a business in Maricopa, Kern County.
I finished high school in Bakersfield High in 1914 and U.S.C. in 1933 because I married John Campbell on July 8, 1918, which was my 23rd birthday.
I had been teaching in Maricopa previously because I had passed the elementary teacher's examinations while I was yet in H.S. a senior.
Which brings me to the 99th birthday Juliet is planning for me, here. Could you and Pat and the boys possibly come? We do not know the day most convenient to you. July 8 comes on a Thursday [actually Friday] , would Friday or Saturday be better? There is a swimming pool on premises, on one may swim and have hamburgers. I cannot talk long. Also, there is a flower garden, so we say "NO PRESENTS or FLOWERS".
Your half uncle, Bob Howe, will be in Anaheim for a grandson's graduation on June 16, so I am visiting them for early celebration. I have not seen them since your Grandmother Lola's funeral about thirty years ago, but we correspond as he is blameless. However, he became a Catholic on marriage and as I am a Christian Scientist ¬ Arden Wood was a C.S. sanitarium. I suspect that he shuns me for that reason. He has four living offspring and several grandchildren. I have met only Michael, the oldest when he was about five.
They which included your Grandmother Lola, had dinner with me at my home in Westwood, L.A. area after John Campbell died. I think it was 1952. My daughter Margaret Rinn and her husband were there, too. Meg as she is called is now in a board and care in Santa Cruz. I still have my house in Watsonville, but do not know if or when either of us can return. The heart operation seemed to cure Meg of diabetes, but she has arthritis and other problems.
When I was at Arden Wood, I invited the Oakland area relatives to visit me, but none did. I realize the problems of health, time, and traffic.
Your Aunt Eileen's widower, who remarried, wrote me as did Diane Wood, my half brother's younger daughter. She is now a grandmother was married after her brother came to see me in Laguna arid tried to in Watsonville, but came down without the address. I have heard he was not normal, but I did not see it in Laguna. His son also wrote me his truck was broken down.
Also, Leeanne Miller wrote. She is your Uncle Marden's daughter. We have talked on the phone, but never seen each other. Marden brought his wife, Audrey, her mother, once to see me when I was at a hotel in S.F. in 1935. She divorced Marden, and she and Leearine are now Catholics. I think she enjoyed a visit with you the day I left for the north in 1979. She is divorced.
My half brother also has an older daughter named Joan. She never liked me, and I never hear from her. She has a son and daughter whom I met once at Bob's house, and the both have children of whom I never hear.
My full brother, Arthur, has a daughter who lives in Ft. Bragg. She is a widow [and] has an only son who has two sons, and with whom I am very friendly.
But, I think the closest of my sister and brother's children is Robert Dearing the only [living JME] offspring of my half sister Corabel. He had two brothers, but one, Richard, was accidentally shot at age 15, and the other, Kenneth, committed suicide after his wife divorced him. He left four children one Robert, now deceased, and one, Richard, by his first[?] wife. Also, a son, Dana, who is divorced after having a couple of children, and who has just met with a severe auto accident.
I wrote to him and to his mother, but have had no answer. His mother, Connie, who is now Mrs. Babcort [?l, said I had hurt her feeling. I don't know why. But, she wore a black mantilla at Kenneth's funeral the divorce was not culminated and I felt she was hypocritical. They had a daughter, Holly, whom I never heard from.
Juliet is here with Ben and Meg's (former) dog. So Au Revoir,
With much love,
Irene
P.S. I must use up this unwritten sheet by telling you my father and Aunt Cora's first husband were brothers. Arthur and Horace respectively. Uncle Horace died when I was living with the Hasmans. Later, she married Chas. Burwell who died in 1916. Their only child had died in 1914. She was a lovely woman who never blamed your Grandmother Lola.
P.S. Jim I enjoyed your letter and brought it to share with my grandmother last Friday. Today, Sunday, she showed me this letter which I think is wonderful except that I do plan to write you! Hope to see you too. Juliet Rees
P.S. I must use up this unwritten sheet by telling you that my father and Aunt Cora’s first husband were brothers. Arthur and Horace, respectfully.
Uncle Horace died when I was living with the Hasmons. Later, she married Charles Burwell who died in 1916. Their only child had died in 1914. She was a lovely woman who never blamed your Grandmother, Lola. [I think Irene is referring to Aunt Cora. JME]
June 13, 1994
Dear Jim and Pat:
Although I wrote you yesterday and Juliet added a corrective P.S., and took it to the mail, I have yet many thoughts about your Miller relatives.
For instance, when I visited Aunt Lola and Uncle Wesley in 1905 and probably in 1906, I met your great grandfather, a genial man who had lost a leg in the Civil War. I did not know enough to ask his rank or what battle. [private, and Battle of Mobile]
They were all living in his house on San Pablo Ave. in Oakland, and he went to S.F. every day for his job as a guard at the S.F. Mint. Also, he drew a pension.
Uncle Wesley had taken Aunt Lola there as a bride, for he was only twenty-one when married, and while he had a job, was not established.
Aunt Lola was obliged to care for her mother-in-law [Mary Axinger Miller] who had cancer, and being a Christian Scientist, refused medical treatment. She died before I saw her.
My memories of 1905 were of Aunt Lola giving Eileen toilet training. She was named Afa Eileen after here grandmother. I mentioned this to Eileen later, but she did not remember my visit.
But, I heard stories of Grandfather Miller’s childhood in North or possibly South Dakota, where he started school. The teacher asked him his name. He said Christopher Müller.” No, said the teacher. You are Christopher Miller, an American. [This story is mentioned by many relatives.]
The family were German immigrants, but I never herd or perhaps remembered from what German state they came. [We know from other sources.] There were few relatives. [Other siblings are mentioned, elsewhere.]
There was a cousin in the Dakotas whom Uncle Wesley said your grandmother was visiting when she left for S.F.
Mr. Miller, the older, was a very generous man, and at the time of the S.F. earthquake and they expected everyone who knew him at the S.F. Mint to come to him in Oakland. They did not, however, and a big ham he had bought to feed them spoiled.
I saw the three rental houses under construction that he was having built.
Later he married a rich widow, and traded the houses with her for the sheep ranch at Main Prairie. [Here, we learn how my grandparents came to move to the ranch.]
Irma was born in the San Pablo Ave. house in May, 1908. I was in the [?] Hospital in S.F. with typhoid fever. Uncle Wesley came to see me, but Aunt Lola did not as is was inconvenient.
My mother had not been able to care for me, as she had two small children, there was no hospital in Ukiah, so our doctor, Dr Dickenson suggested the S.F. one. I was laid on a stretcher in the baggage car. It was a painful trip. I never saw Mr. Miller, Sr. again. He had had an earlier marriage, but his wife had died [I assume this is Mary, my grandmother.] , and there were no children.
As I wrote, I started teaching school in Maricopa as soon as I graduated from high school. In October, 1914, Grandma Hasman came to visit us. I was living with my mother and stepfather. She saw my difficulty as a first time teacher and said she and Mister had said that the next year I could come live with them and go to U.C. for two year which would enable me to teach anywhere in the State.
So in 1915 I went to Berkeley to live with them. It was eventful for them. They bought a car --- an unusual luxury in 1915. Gramdma and I went to the World Fair in S.F. where we saw ex-president Theodore Roosevelt, and Mister developed cancer.
I finished my freshman year in Berkeley, and in late May went to S.F. for vacation work.
I worked at the Colony Hotel in S.F. for vacation work. I went to the Colony Hotel in S.F. as the telephone operator and doubled as a waitress. There, I met Rees H. John, a Welshman who had come to the U.S. in 1913 or ’14. We started going together, and when I had worked two months, your grandparents invited me for a rest at their home in Main Prarie. I went, and Rees came up on weekends, also.
A Miss Emily Roth, the school teacher, lived there, too. I think it was a one room school that your mother, Eileen, and Mardin attended. [See photo, earlier.] Your grandparents were very generous when my step-father lost his business in a lumber mill in Ukiah, due mostly to the partner’s dishonesty. In 1910, he asked if my mother and the two younger children could stay with them until he got settled. It meant “support” as “staying” was a commitment as relatives, in 1910.
I stayed from March, 1910 until June 29, 1910 with Miss Gibson and her brother, also an 8th grader, for Miss G. felt it would be a mistake to take me out of school when I had so nearly completed the 8th grade. So we left Ukiah on the 20th after graduation for S.F. Miss Gibson turned me over to Mister, and I stayed with them all summer in Oakland. My mother wanted me to continue to live with them as I had in Elk Grove, but Mister thought I would be too much of an expense, so I was ut on the train for Kern County where my stepfather and Corabel met me.
Next day we went to Maricopa. I was shocked at an oil field town. But I still had to go through high school, and there was non in Maricopa, there. Finally, though, a relative of R.R thought of Selma, Fresno County, and I went there boarding for a year. Until, in 1918, at high school I was established with about twelve pupils in Maricopa, CA.
It was then only a two year high school, so in 1912, I went to Kern County High School in Bakersfield, boarding, until I graduated in 1914.
After teaching a year, and going to U.C. for a year, Grandma and Mister left on a long auto tour while I was working in S.F. When U.C. started again in Fall, 1916, they had not returned, and Uncle Fred Kirk invited me to stay in a big house he rented on 16th Street in Oakland, and eat with Aunt Cora who was there, also, a working widow. While there I met Lemar Lee Howe who was an art school student in S.F, and came over to see your grandmother who was making a visit. [This must have been how the romantic liaison began.] I saw him only once more many years later.
But in October of 1916, I came down with pneumonia and was in the U.C. infirmary. I was threatened with T.B. by the doctors, and advised to go home, south. I did.
In May, Rees, his brother, his brother’s wife and nephew came to visit me in Maricopa. Rees stayed at my home several days and Mama invited him for Christmas. In 1917 World War I began [for the U.S.], and he was in an important industry, but he came Christmas, 1917.
But on March 8, 1918, I met John Campbell, and immediately realized he was a more suitable partner. He had helped his mother and two sisters for eight years, turning his earnings over to his mother who was a widow.
Also, he was an American born in S.F. When he became an oil driller in 1911, and got a fine foreign job in Romania, he paid for his mother to come. She brought her sister, and he provided for them and paid their way back when World War I threatened Romania.
As I said, when I met him it was instant attraction, and we were married on my birthday, July 8, 1918. We took our honeymoon in his Dodge to Yosemite and Lake Tahoe. I had never been to either, and then down to Oakland where we stayed one night with your grandparents.
Your mother said, if she couldn’t get one John, then she got another,” which we all thought cute.
My new husband took a picture snapshot of your mother, Mardin, and I out on the front step when we left. I saw the snapshot in Watsonville, and will send it to you when I find it, again. [She didn’t.]
I did not see them again until I went to Oakland and Berkeley for summer school in 1919. By that time Uncle Wesley and children were alone.
Bob Howe had been born in April, 1918, but your grandfather offered to claim him as his own if the mother would return. Later, he divorced her.
Of course, I saw Irma and all that summer, but not again until I had had another sick spell, and John Campbell returned from Trinidad, British West Indies, where we had been. By this time he [my grandfather] was married to Bonnie. We all danced a his home, and I marveled at your Mom’s efficiency. She was only a girl, but the way she made sandwiches, etc., was remarkable.
I never returned to Trinidad, but my husband did, and to make ends meet in the Depression, he asked me to return to teaching. I did --- in L.A. City, where I taught for 25 years.
Irma and Bonnie visited me once staying at the Mayfair Hotel. I believe John was in Trinidad. My children were boarding with a friend in Riverside, and I saw them on weekends. I lived at the Hotel Acacia in Los Angeles.
I graduated from U.S.C. in 1933 after many night and late P.M. courses. In a philosophy class I was the only one who had ever heard of Swedenborg. Your grandparents studied many philosophers --- including Christian Science and Swedenborg --- so I had heard of him.
My mother, stepfather, my son John and daughter Margaret, aged 8, attended my commencement at U.S.C. My husband paid a visit soon afterwards in 1933. He had been working in Venezuela and Trinidad, and we had not seen him --- due to money for five years. He returned to Trinidad and visited again in 1936.
He came home very ill in 1948. We bought a house in the Westwood, L.A. area, and lived there until he died in 1952.
My son married in 1948, and my daughter in 1947. I remarried in 1971. I am now almost 99. I have had many experiences.
Returning to horoscopes, which Wesley [my grandfather] was an expert . My favorite people were born January 25th. They were: Aunt Lola, my next door neighbor in Whittier named Bertha Kendall, a fellow teacher in L.A., and my friend who took care of my children in Riverside for almost ten years.
Do you believe in horoscopes? I do not, but what about the Jan 25 coincidence?
My mother cared for my children while I taught when we lived in Whittier --- 1923 to 1928. She visited the Howes in L.A. once, and they drove her home to Whittier. I met Bob Howe for the first time, Lemar for the second, and Aunt Lola after years of silence.
Can you come to my party in July?
Love,
Irene
P.S. In the articles about D Day, I read of General Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., who was on the beach in Normandy. I think Omaha. He was married to your mother’s relative.
I met Bob Howe and his father --- third time --- at Aunt Lola’s memorial service. My son, John, took me. There were only five of us there.
Irene
June 30, 1994
Canoga Park, CA
Dear Jim and Pat,
The party hours on July 8 are from 5 to 7pm, and I am glad that you can come.
There will be a strange assortment of people, an old retired admiral who said we met at his son’s wedding five years ago, “I haven’t seen you since my retirement party twenty years ago.” He lives in Encino.
Also, invitations were sent to Japan, New York, Anaheim and Moorpark where Bob Howe’s four children live, respectively.
We have not received responses. When he and wife visited me a week or so ago, I had not seen them since your grandmother’s memorial services about 30 years ago.
Thee were only five people there. He telephoned the four addresses to Juliet who met them then for the first time.
I did not see the invitations at that time, but I knew they were supposed to say, “No presents. No flowers. Hamburgers and swimming in the patio pool --- casual dress.”
Juliet is anxious to meet you and Pat. She says you sound very nice. Meg, my daughter who will not be here --- she is in a board and care facility in Santa Cruz --- said you had such an honest face --- just like me! Bob Howe will not be here as he lives in Nevada.
Love,
Irene
July 11, 1994
Canoga Park, CA
Dear Jim and Pat,
You know how delighted I was to see you, but hope we can continue our talk some other time. I am sure you were as shocked to hear about Lemar as I was in 1935. I had just come from a trip across the U.S.A., Canada, and Mexico, and my brother Arthur, his wife, and my mother were driving us around when we happened to pass a house in Vallejo where they said a cousin lived.
I wanted them to get out with me and inquire about him, but my mother said, “No, and you will be sorry if you do.”
But, I went in alone and met with my cousin, his wife, daughter, and father. Then I said, “Do you know where my father is?” I hadn’t seen him since my parents were divorced in 1901. George hesitated, then said, “He’s in Napa State Hospital for the insane.”
I had been told that he went to Washington, D.C. to edit a newspaper. He was a printer by trade. My mother remarried in 1902, and we went to live in Ukiah, CA until 1910. My stepfather wondered why he [my real father] never came to see his children, Arthur and me. I don’t think she ever told him.
An irony is that both my mother and stepfather were attendants at Mendocino State Hospital when they met.
Returning back to Lamar and my Aunt Lola, she was asked when the family was living on the ranch in Maine Prairie by some group, I think maybe the Methodist Church or Eastern Star --- for your grandfather was a dedicated Mason as was my husband, John Campbell --- to write letters to inmates in San Quentin who could be rehabilitated.
She began a correspondence with the one [inmate] she was given --- Lemar. He said her letters were like those of some popular --- and good --- writer of the day. I do not remember her name.
My Aunt Lola was well educated, extremely bright, and clever in many ways.
You know the rest. When she became pregnant after her first departure, Uncle Wesley said he would acknowledge the child as his own if she would return permanently --- for she had returned for a short period.
No matter what the error of the parents, none can blame the child or refuse forgiveness to the parents upon repentance.
I have seen Lamar twice since I met him in 1926. My mother, Lola’s half-sister, went to see them in 1927. They brought my mother back to my home in Whittier --- where she was visiting me.
My son, John who had been put to bed, naughtily got up when he heard another little boy. They stayed only a few minutes.
He came to pick up my mother and Aunt Cora who were visiting me when I was living on 31st Street in L.A. It was 1954, I think. He took the three sisters to his son’s home, who is now married and who lived in Sylmar with his wife and child.
I did not go or even see him. My husband, John Campbell disapproved of them.
But, after my husband died in 1952, I invited Bob Howe, his wife, and son, and Aunt Lola to dinner at my home in Westwood. I didn’t invite Lemar.
I never saw Lamar after 1927 until Aunt Lola became ill. Then John and I went to see her at her hospital. She passed on soon after. He was at the hospital, too.
There were five people at her memorial service --- Lemar, Bob, and wife, and John and I.
As you my know, I belong to the Christian Science Church. Recently, a fine article on forgiveness was published by the Church.
I am saving it to send to my daughter, Margaret, who has been an invalid some 24 years, and who is not a Scientist. She doesn’t seem able to forgive her divorced husband for his unfaithfulness to her. They were married for 31 years, and had three children.
Margaret is in a board and care in Santa Cruz. I could not longer care for her. I never saw Lamar after the services, but I did send him Christmas greetings until he died at age 93. I never saw Bob or Helen either until a few days ago when they visited me at this rest home. I invited them to the birthday party, and he gave Juliet the addresses of his four children, so Juliet invited them, too. None of them came, but Bob and Helen sent me a birthday card.
Thank you for your beautiful card and visit. Do come again when convenient.
Much love,
Irene
P.S. I should have started this letter on this [paper] instead of the card. I ramble on.
August 21, 1994
Canoga Park, CA
Dear Jim and Pat,
The party is now a memory, so I enclosed concrete evidence of it by the pictures.
They are self-explanatory except the one of the Admiral and me. The Admiral insisted in eating the birthday cake at my bedside. His wife sent it.
Upon leaving, he kissed me and I said, “I have never been kissed by an admiral before. “ --- by any other sailor unless one wishes to call John Campbell a sailor.
After his return from twelve years work in South America, he bought a sloop. He and his cousin, Charles Paxton, the Admiral’s father, saild it from Long Beach to Santa Monica harbor.
We enjoyed it when we lived in Westwood, but found it too expensive in upkeep for a retired person.
I enjoyed seeing you and Pat so much. I trust all is well with you and yours and that I shall see you again.
Lovingly,
Irene
January 11, 1995
Dear Jim and Pat,
Thank you so much for the New Year’s card. I am so relieved. I am glad that all are well, and I trust the boys got good grades this semester.
I hope you will come see me, but at your convenience. I know how busy you are. Even I am busy. I write poetry and a wire letter from the Publishing House of Christian Science Literature. They referred me to their writers and said the editors were considering it. I want to have your genealogies right so I’ll make a correction.
My and your mother’s grandmother was Martha Ella Sayles. Her first husband was Joseph Lambert, a student at Hastings Law School, San Francisco. My mother was their offspring. She was born in 1869 at a very early age to Grandma Ella, as we called her.
Grandma said it was a double wedding, so she was legitimate. He died so Mom was also brought up by the Sayles grandparents.
Grandma Ella’s second husband was Ben Kirk. Mama knew him well, as Grandma Ella returned to the Sayles home with him to care for her father, Thomas, after her mother also died.
Joseph Hasman, born in Czechoslovakia, often visited Thomas Sayles and Grandmother Ella divorced Ben Kirk to marry him. She married him in May, 1897. They celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary in their home in Berkeley where I attended as I was living with them in my first year at the University of California, Berkeley.
I had lived with them in Elk Grove from the time I was three to seven. I called Joseph Hasman, “Mister,” as I was told to, he not being my grandfather soon all the relatives called him “Mister.”
During that time I became acquainted with your grandmother, Lola May Kirk (also she went by the name of Hasman as they were married when she was about eight. I loved her very much, and she cared for me, both physically and spiritually. I remember so many things about the relationship.
In 1901 my mother divorced my father, Arthur Vickers Boyne. She was married to him in November, 1887 [year may not be correct], so you should refer to me as Irene Boyne --- not Irene Lambert. I had an older brother Arthur Vivian [?] Boyne, born June 15, 1891. He married Elizabeth Davis in 1910 and died in 1963. I think the telegram came to me at Laguna Beach apartment. Elizabeth is now also gone, but they had one daughter, Florence Gertrude, born December 19, 1918, who lives in Ft Bragg, CA. She married a Mr. Oliver by whom she had a son, Larry, but later divorced him. You met Larry and his family on July 8, 1994.
Juliet Campbell Shirr was also an only child, daughter of my deceased son, John, Jr. She has a son also who lives in El Centro, CA, but had to work so could not come to the party. She was married February 1, 1947 to John Rinn, but divorced him twenty years later.
She is in a board and care place after a heart operation, but I am keeping the house in order so she can move back. It has termites. Juliet comes this a.m. to tell me about it as she is my executrix.
My mother married my step-father in 1902. I was given the name Lucas, but was never adopted. I married John Sinclare Campbell on July 8, 1918. On our honeymoon we visited Aunt Lola and Uncle Wesley. I have a picture of your mother, Mardin, and me on the steps as we left. If I can find it --- packed --- do you want it? I was going to offer it to Lee Ann, Mardin’s only child.
Bob Howe and wife visited me a little while before the party on July 8, 1993. I had not seen them since Aunt Lola’s memorial service which John, Jr. and I attended.
Meg and her husband met them in 1952. I invited them to dinner in my Westwood home after John Campbell died. They brought their only child, Michael. A daughter, Stephanie, had recently died. Now they have another daughter, unmarried, and two more sons --- two are married, one lives in Tokyo which they visited every so often.
I never saw Michael again, but he is married, divorced, remarried, with children. They are all Catholics, as is Lee Ann. I cannot write more. Please excuse this hand.
Much love,
Irene
January 12, 1995
Dear Ones,
When I sealed the letter to you yesterday, I found that I had forgotten to put in the Bertulfo Home card [where Irene was living]. I do so now, although my forgetfulness costs me another 32 cents. However I had asked Juliet to bring me 100 or so, there is no shortage.
As you may opine, she is my favorite granddaughter. And although she is of U.C.L.A., and I of U.S.C., and they fight. We never do.
Also this gives me an opportunity to write a little more about the family which I could write reams.
Did you know that Great Aunt Cora’s first husband was my father’s brother, Horace Boyne? I remember her seeing the invitation to the wedding in Grandma Ella’s old bible. It was held at my parents house on Q [?] Street in Sacramento. I do not remember the number, but I remember Uncle Horace painting wild roses in the corners of Grandma Ella’s parlor ceiling in Elk Grove. He was artistic.
He died in 1900, I think, and I attended the funeral with Aunt Cora and Grandma. Perhaps my mother. We rode in a carriage, and I wanted the curtains up so I could see out. I was not allowed to.
I took my mother to Sacramento in about 1954, and we went to see the Q Street house. We went also to the cemetery where our great grandparents Sayles and Uncle Horace are, and Mama put a sheaf of yellow roses on the graves. Also there is General Theodore Roosevelt, Teddy’s son who married your Kirk relative. He led the assault on the Germans at a beach on D-Day.
Looking forward to your visit.
Love,
Irene
March 29, 1995
How is Tom doing? I hope all of you are well and will help me celebrate my 100th birthday on Saturday, July 8th, ’05.
However, Juliet and Rap, who were to give me the party may be in Russia. He returned from Moscow earlier this month, but is to go again in April. She wants to go, too. He is an engineer with the joint space shuttle. He brought me a book of Russian art which I much prefer to modern art like this card.
However, relatives gave it to me after visiting the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
I have just written to Andy to thank him for the graduation announcement, but I know from experience that parents deserve congratulations, too.
Our son John had a year and a half at U.S.C. before he went into the Army Air Force in World War II. Our daughter, Margaret (Meg) graduated from Fresno State College in 1946. She had to leave U.C. Davis when the U.S. Army took it over.
Looking forward to seeing you.
With love,
Irene
September 29, 1995
Dear Jim and Pat,
Thank you so much for coming to my 100th celebration.
I have felt for a long time that the parents of a college graduate should have a present, too. My mother, your Great Aunt Blanch, gave me a set of six silver spoons when I graduated from U.S.C.
So, I would like to pass them on --- to be given to Andy when he marries. But I had already promised them to Elizabeth Paxton --- a relative by marriage to John Paxton. Did you meet them at the party? Or their father, the Admiral, U.S.N., (ret.)? The relationship is through him who is a second cousin to my first husband, John S. Campbell.
However, my daughter Margaret or Meg --- as she is known --- told me that Elizabeth has no recollection of the promise --- so I wrote her to ask her if she would not rather accept six silver spoons my second husband got in Moscow. Two are teaspoons, four are after dinner coffee spoons. All are decorated with the Moscow inscription in enamel.
If she will not consent to my wish, would you care for them? Also, I thought you would be interested to know that my enclosed poem was accepted by [the] National Poetry Association, and will be published 12/1996. It was rejected by the Christian Science Monitor, but accepted four others.
Love,
Irene
P.S. the E. stands for Grandma Hasman’s middle name who I was named for. She is your great grandmother. 1748 was the date of the Battle of Culloden of which we spoke.
April 22, 1996
Dear Jim and Pat,
Thank you for your letter of April 19th with the cheerful and kind comments.
I love trips. I was sent to Washington D.C. in 1935. I toured the White House the Capital and the Lincoln monuments and the cherry trees from Japan. They were not in bloom because it was in mid summer. I found the name of my former teacher who taught me French and Spanish in the telephone directory. She taught me in Bakersfield High School from which I graduated in 1914. She was now Mrs. Davis, and her husband was a captain in World War I. They came to see me and took me to Mt. Vernon, Washington’s estate and home, Arlington Cemetery, and other points. They asked about my children and I said that their son just looked like my son. Mr. Davis said that his wife and I look so much alike he thought that we were relatives.
Then I went on to Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina.
I had seen an advertisement for a trip to Los Angeles and Mexico City for $100.00, so I had taken it. I entered Mexico by Nogales and returned by way of El Paso from which we took a trip to Carlsbad Caverns. All this was for a $180, a month’s teaching salary. You can hardly believe the inflation of these times. Please don’t embellish my poem because there will be three more and better ones. The C. S. Publishing House had accepted three more, but did not say when they will be published.
The National Poetry Association has accepted one too, and said it would be published in a book of various poets in 1996. The book costs $80, so I should not buy it --- unless they give me a prize. Please come and see me when you can. I love visitors.
Lovingly yours,
Irene
Note: My handwriting was so bad my new care provider was the one who wrote this letter for me. Her name is Emelda Garcia.
[This was the last letter we received from Irene before she died.]