Grandma Lyon - Beloved Citizen - Goes Home

Will Be Held In Loving Remembrance By All Who Knew Her

Grandma Lyon has passed to her heavenly reward-a reward of which there is no doubt-sure and steadfast, eternal in the heavens.

Grandma Lyon, aged 87, loved and beloved by the whole community. The world's poverty of enduring love, tolerance of fellow beings, constructive effort, deep interest in youth, love of music, of literature and of all things beautiful and good exists because there are not more women with the heart and will of Grandma Lyon.

Unlike most elderly people Grandma Lyon did not live in the past, but always in the present with a keen look ahead. She was of those who thinketh no evil, seeth no evil and speaketh no evil but whose motherly heart embraced all in tender and loving solicitude and whose whole life was a beneficent influence for good in the lives of all with whom she came in contact.

The home of Grandpa and Grandma Lyon has always been most hospitable and everyone has always been made welcome in it. It has on countless occasions been the scene of happy family, neighborhood and community gatherings.

Always a great lover of music, Grandma Lyon attracted those who were gifted in music and who spoke and read. Many have been the fine musical and literary programs held in her home and she was unstinting in her praise and encouragement.

As the years of her life crept on from three score and ten to fourscore and more, she has had to give up much of her previous activity and her faithful attendance at church and other public gatherings. Although confined pretty close to her home for some years past she never relinquished her deep interest in the events of community life or her desire to help advance the things that were desirable and of benefit to the rising generation.

For a number of years she deplored the lack of a public library in this community and she constantly agitated the subject and urged her friends and acquaintances to do likewise. We believe it largely due to her persistent and constructive agitation that the people's minds were made alive to this necessity and that through the cooperation of leaders in the community it was finally brought to pass. Grandma Lyon's cookie jar, as well as her loving heart was a source of everlasting supply to the delight and satisfaction of her many little friends.

In recent years she has had many severe sick spells but she has fought the way valiantly back to a measure of health each time until her last illness which came on a few weeks ago. For the last two weeks it was feared that the illness would prove her last and her relatives were called to her bedside. Her mind was alert and clear as ever but the bodily strength became very weak and about four o'clock Saturday morning, July 7, 1928, her spirit, released from the pain-wracked body, passed on to the celestial and eternal realm.

While she did not unduly dwell upon death, she had for many years been prepared to answer the summons and meet her God.

Funeral Services were conducted at the home on Monday afternoon by Rev. Martin Hyink, of Castlewood, S. Dak., formerly pastor of the Presbyterian church of this place, which has since disbanded and of which Mrs. Lyon was a faithful and active member. Rev. Hylink was assisted in the services by Rev. R. E. Willis, pastor of the Inwood Methodist Church. The choir and pianist were neighbors and friends of Mrs. Lyon, who many timess during her shut-in condition have cheered her with song and music.

Mrs. Katherine Brenner Lyon was born May 31, 1841, at Lancaster, PA. Her girlhood was spent in Pennyslvania. At the age of 14 her parents moved to Freeport, IL. She was a daughter of Adam Brenner and Susan Yordy. There were twelve children in this family, five girls and seven boys. J. A. Brenner of Canton, SD, is the only surviving member of the family. She was united in marriage with George W. Lyon, July 3, 1865, just shortly after Mr. Lyon was mustered out of service, he having served four years with the army of the north, and having volunteered at the beginning of the war. After their marriage they moved to Lyon County, this was in the year 1876, where they lived on a farm west of Inwood. For the past 25 years they have made their home in Inwood. (condensed)

Son William Ellis Lyon (1875-1953)