Last Name	First Name	Maiden Name	Birth Date	Death Date	Age	Source	Remarks	Contact
Lisenbee	Robert G.			10-Apr-2001	76	Obituary

From the collections at the Leavenworth County Historical Society and Museum. Reprinted with permission from The Leavenworth County Historical Society and Museum and the Leavenworth Times. Donated by Debra Graden.

Within a three-month period in 1898, a grand-mother, daughter and grand-daughter were buried in Lenape Cemetery. Margaret Gallagher visited the graves of her ancestors not long ago. She remembers her mother, Sarah, telling of the deaths.

"My mother was 9 years old when her mother died," the Tonganoxie woman said. "They believe she must have died in childbirth because the little girl died just a few months later."

Amanda Penrol Allen was 33 years old and had seven children two years before the century mark was reached. Her granddaughter says the children she left banded together after their mother's untimely death.

"My mother said they did the best they could. She had twin sisters who were 15 at the time and I guess they helped raise the little ones. They might not have known how to care for a little baby and that's probably why Amy Agnes died," she said.

Just a few weeks after her daughter's death, Katherine Penrod died from burns she suffered in a home accident. Mrs. Gallagher said the woman was cleaning with gasoline in the front part of the home.

"When she walked to the back of the house, a spark from the stove or fireplace must have caught her skirts. Her death hit the family pretty hard."

Charles H. Allen was 24 years older than his wife and lived 26 years after she died. He farmed in the Lenape community before the flood of 1903. Located four miles east of Linwood on a bluff about one mile north of the Kansas River, the cemetery was just over the hill from Lenape.

Mrs. Gallagher says her mother told of several homes and possibly a saw mill and the Loring School wasn't far.

"But when they had to go to town, they took the road over the river to DeSoto. After the flood, that all changed."

Her grandfather lost everything. After the flood waters had receded, only farm equipment was left. It was unusable. Allen moved his family to the east part of the Fairmount. Trips to the cemetery, however, were frequent.

"The old people would say, 'Take your dinner if you're going to a funeral at Lenape.' It was probably one of the few times relatives and friends came together and after the burial, they would stay around and visit. They would pay their respects at the graves of their family members, too," Mrs. Gallagher said.

The earliest burials occurred in the 1870s. The five acres that made up the original land grant came March 9, 1880, from J. Hames. At that time the Sherman Township Cemetery Association handled the Lenape Cemetery and several others.

Today's cemetery has about 200 marked graves and is often used.

Article donated by Debra Graden, President
Leavenworth County Genealogical Society, 1998