June Ann Bailey

June was born in Detroit, Michigan on June 18, 1938 to Lydia and Albert Kamego. A strong student with a razor-sharp mind, June graduated in 1956 from Eastern High School. Upon graduation from high school, she worked for the Detroit Board of Education. Encouraged by the mentorship of Dr. and Mrs. Richard Dresher, she saved money and attended night classes. She enrolled in Michigan State University and graduated with a degree in Elementary Education, making her the first person in her family to go to college and receive a college degree. She carried her education forward by receiving a Master’s degree from Avila College.

She met her future husband, Edwin Bailey, at Michigan State University. After they married in 1960, they moved to Buffalo, New York and began their shared life’s journey together, forging a strong marriage and devoted partnership that would last until Edwin’s death in 2019. June dreamed of being a mother, and her dream was fulfilled with the birth of her two children, Lisbeth (Beth) and Michael. She delighted in seeing her children discover the world around them and was fortunate to be a stay-at-home mom until the children entered school. June then began a twenty-one year career working with children as a public school teacher. She worked with special needs children, and she would share with her family stories about her students’ struggles, successes, and adventures at school. June cared deeply for her students and gave them her all. After work, she would take a few minutes to recharge and then she would fix her family a healthy and delicious dinner, which the family would enjoy together at the family table. Her children and husband always hoped for, and often received, one of her famous baked desserts that often disappeared as quickly as she could make it.

June’s core values were decidedly old-fashioned. Above all, she was devoted to her family–to her children and to husband but also to her parents and to her extended family. She believed that people have roles to play in life and that social life hangs together only when people meet the expectations of their social obligations. This meant insisting upon appropriate behavior at home, in one’s neighborhood, at work, and in public. It meant setting aside one’s personal preferences to help those in need. Though June valued being self-sufficient herself, she regularly volunteered her time and service to friends, colleagues, and neighbors who were in need of food or house-cleaning or physical care or companionship. She did this without fanfare or self-promotion. She never thought of her donated service as charity but as simply doing the right thing. Even as she suffered through a two-year long battle with cancer that she eventually beat, she continued to care about others who were less fortunate than herself.

Although June’s values were old-fashioned, she closely followed politics and the broader cultural world. Her curiosity was boundless, and she made the best partner in games of trivia. She was a wonderful and witty and bright companion with far-ranging interests and with settled and unambiguous opinions on most everything. June loved her friends dearly, but her daughter Beth was her closest and dearest friend of all.

No discussion of June can omit her heightened sense of irony and her sharp sense of humor. June had the uncanny knack of reducing a matter to its essence, and she had a special gift for insightful observations and clever and sardonic turns of phrase. Sometimes she laughed until she cried, and she could make others laugh as hard and as long. Nothing, however, brought her as much joy as her three granddaughters, Lydia, Emma Rose, and Eleanor.

Mrs. Bailey was preceded in death by her parents, Albert and Lydia, and her husband Edwin. She is survived by her children Lisbeth Eileen and Michael Edwin; her daughter-in-law Julianne Lindholm Bailey; and her grandchildren Lydia Margaret, Emma Rose, and Eleanor Eileen Bailey. Also surviving are brother Albert Kamego and sister-in-law Claire Kamego and many nephews and nieces.

June was a teacher at heart, and her life holds a lesson for us all. June developed Alzheimer’s late in life, and it was distressing for those around her to see that disease unleash its predictable terrible effects on her faculties. Nonetheless, June was a fighter, and she found new and surprising ways to hold on to her personality. Though she lost her capacity to express herself in words, she never lost her sense of humor. And to the great surprise and happiness of her children and grandchildren, June found in her last months and years a newfound freedom to dance without inhibition and for the simple joy of living. Her last great role in life was to be free and joyful, and she embraced it for all she was worth.

Family woman, doting grandmother, tireless worker, loyal friend, old-fashioned traditionalist, acute social observer, and dancer extraordinaire, June Bailey contained multitudes. She will be dearly remembered, sorely missed, and, along with her husband, serve as a model in memory and by example of how to live a life lived for others.

A Memorial Visitation will be held from 4:00pm to 6:00pm on Thursday, December 28 at Mt. Moriah, Newcomer & Freeman Funeral Home, 10507 Holmes Road, Kansas City, Missouri. In lieu of flowers, please consider making a donation in June’s memory to the National Audubon Society or Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.