Kay Raymond

Virginia Kathleen “Kay” Raymond passed away on Christmas Day, 2019. She was 99. Born to Claude and Bessie Lisman on December 9, 1920, Kay grew up in New Lebanon and Sullivan Indiana and earned a BA in Sociology from Franklin College in Indiana, where she also joined Zeta Tau Delta Sorority. Kay married Richard W. Raymond on December 29, 1941. During World War II, Kay worked as a clerk at Washington National Insurance Company in Evanston, Illinois, while her husband Dick served in the Army Air Corps. After the war, Kay and Dick lived for nearly 40 years in Evanston. While Dick worked as an executive in the teacher’s group department at Washington National, Kay became a homemaker, a mother of three children, and an active member of Northminster Presbyterian Church in Evanston.

After Dick’s retirement in 1982, Kay and Dick moved to Savannah, Georgia, where they both became members of White Bluff Presbyterian Church and served actively in its ministry to the homeless. Kay also served as president of the Women’s Club in Savannah.

After her husband Dick’s passing in 2000, Kay moved in 2001to Modesto, California, where she lived near daughter Linda Raymond Bracht and her husband Ted Bracht. After developing dementia in 2010, Kay moved to Starkville, Mississippi, to live with her son Rich and his wife Judy. After Rich and Judy’s retirement in 2016, Kay moved near their home in Story, Wyoming. At the time of her passing, Kay resided at the Greenhouse in Sheridan, Wyoming.

Kay was preceded in death by daughter Linda K. Raymond Bracht (2013) as well as by husband Dick, sister Alyce Ladd, brother John Lisman, brother Claude Lisman Jr., sister Wanda Irene Lisman, and brother-in-law Charles Ladd. Kay is survived by sister Marian Wardell; by son Richard C. Raymond and daughter-in-law Judy Raymond; by son Philip W. Raymond and daughter-in-law Elizabeth Raymond; by son-in-law Theodore Bracht; by grandchildren Heather Raymond Mason, Anna Raymond McCraney, Matthew Raymond and his wife Kristen Raymond, Warner Raymond and his wife Sarah Murphy, and Laura Bracht Appleby and her husband Josh Appleby; by great-grandchildren Roy McCraney, Joshua Wainwright, Nathanael Wainwright, Ellie Raymond, Lyla Appleby, Piper Appleby, Daphne Appleby, Tulip Appleby, and Leland Raymond; by nieces Cheryl Holladay, Lisa Stepro, Annette Engle, Alyce Nolen, Claudia Swisher, and Jamie Hales; by nephews Mike Wardell, David Wardell, Jim Ladd, and John Ladd; and by many great- and great-great nieces and nephews.

One bitter-sweet memory: In 2013, while living with Rich and Judy Raymond in Mississippi, Kay had just finished looking through the University of Wyoming alumni magazine. At lunch, she mentioned to son Rich, who graduated from UW in 1969, that she had a son who attended UW. Saddened by Kay’s inability to connect her memory with the son sitting next to her, Rich took her to the hallway in the back of the house, where rows of family photos lined the walls. After walking Kay down the hallway and naming all the people in the photos, Rich drew her eyes to the photos featuring himself and Kay over the decades. Suddenly, Kay’s eyes lit up as she made that elusive link between present and past. Then she gave Rich a big hug.

Cremation and inurnment will take place at Kane Funeral Home in Sheridan, Wyoming. Grave-side services will be held at Memorial Park Cemetery in Skokie, Illinois, where her ashes will be interred next to her husband, Richard W. Raymond.

Online condolences may be written at www.kanefuneral.com.

Kane Funeral Home has been entrusted with local arrangements.