The following
story was given to me by
Jacqueline Dona Lam bert
Her email address is:
lambertjacquelin@hotmail.com
I hadn't been able to get any information on the Lambert side of my family because my
father doesn't really know anything and his mother, Blanche, died when I was 15. I only
knew her for 3 years but she was a major influence on my life and I still think of her
frequently. Blanche was Frank's second wife. She left him about 2 years after the stock
market crashed and with her two sons went back to her family, most of which was now living
in Kansas City. They were originally from Diamond, MO, which is about 30 minutes from
where I live now. I've lived all over the USA, but settled in this area about 5 years ago.
I think it's interesting to find that this is where my family comes from as I didn't know
that when I moved here.
My understanding from family remembrances, most of which came from my mother, as she
remembers Blanche relating to her over the years, so that's kind of sketchy, is that Frank
was a "crackerjack" (meaning outstanding) salesman from Canada working in
Chicago, who came from wealthy Catholic family in Quebec. My dad said this was Lambert
Pharmaceuticals, but he tells tall stories sometimes. Frank divorced his first wife to
marry Blanche so was blackballed from his family. When the market crashed, Frank lost most
of his money, but not all. Over the next couple of years Blanche sold off the silver and
whatever they had to pay the bills, but Frank was still carrying on like he had the money
to blow. When Blanche had enough she left. Frank followed her to Kansas City shortly
afterward, but Blanche wouldn't let him move in with her, she was staying with her sister
who watched the boys while she worked as a tool and die maker. They did see each other and
she hoped that he would settle down, get a job and be responsible. He kept disappearing.
Eventually he got a job as a salesman in KC, got an apartment, but also got a girlfriend
who lived with him. Blanche and Frank were still married, though. My dad remembers him and
Wayne going to visit his dad, then finally living with him when Blanche couldn't provide
daycare for them as her sister also got a job to survive and the girlfriend not taking
very good care of them.
Dad said his dad and the girlfriend took off at some point and left the boys alone. My dad
(Donald) was 8 y/o then and Wayne was a couple of years younger. Social services stepped
in and put them in Gillis boys home. Blanche had one day off, Sunday, and she used to ride
the city bus all day to get there to visit them, stay a few hours, then ride back. She did
that every Sunday for 2 years. Shortly after they went to Gillis my dad contracted polio
and was paraplegic for a year or so. He eventually regained the use of his legs and when
he was 11 was sent to live with a family on a farm outside Rich Hill, Kansas. They were
wealthy, only had one daughter and wanted a son. They took very good care of him, treated
him like a son, bought him a car, and wanted him to inherit the farm. He got in trouble a
lot always doing wild things. He wanted to be a pilot so joined the Navy after two years
at Kansas University. Shortly after that the Navy scaled back it's pilot program and cut
him loose, so he joined the Marines to be a pilot, became one, and was in the Marines for
17 years. He met my mom in Kansas City shortly after joining the Marines. He retired to KC
when I was almost 13, and we lived with Blanche until he got a job and we got a house.
Blanche died a few years later. I lived in KC a few more years, then moved to Colorado
after traveling around the USA for a bit. I lived in Colorado, mostly around Boulder, for
15 years, then in San Diego for 10 years.
Wayne didn't fare so well with his placement, also on a farm, in Lawrence, Kansas. He was
treated as a hired hand and lived in the barn and beaten a lot. But he made straight As in
school, was an Eagle Scout, went to college, became a Chiropractor, married a floozy whom
Blanche hated, had a turbulent 1.5 years, then he divorced the floozy after she left him
for another man (having had an affair is my understanding) and he moved to Michigan or
someplace like that. He met Priscilla, a minister's daughter, married her, and they had
two daughters, maybe 3. He ended up going to work for IBM there, got transferred to
Boulder, Colorado when I was living in Denver (married) and my husband, daughters and I
went with both my parents (who were divorced by then and out visiting me for the birth of
my youngest daughter) to visit him and his wife. He was the President of a division of IBM
then. My husband ended up getting a job with IBM shortly afterwards and has worked there
since. He and I divorced about 14 years ago. Priscilla didn't like Wayne's family,
particularly my Dad, so limited contact. Wayne died of a heart attack while playing golf,
his passion, about 5 years later (guessing as to time) and we went for the funeral. After
that, Priscilla cut off all contact and no one seems to be able to find her.
I also lost contact with Blanche's side of the family after my parents divorced when I was
16 y/o as my mother didn't want to have anything to do with them or them with her. My
father was gone a lot most of my growing up years, and drank some, so wasn't very reliable
and the family had a lot to say about him being just like his father. In a lot of ways he
was. Blanche (and my dad remembers also) said that Frank used to smoke $5 cigars, drove a
large white convertible top Cadillac and wore a white suit and panama hat and carried on
like he was made of money. My dad, in his own way, did the same sort of thing. My dad quit
drinking about 28 years ago and has been an upstanding citizen since then, but went
through a couple more relationships/marriages before he met Beverly, whom he's been
married to about 28 years. My parents were married for 17 years.
My mother tells that a body was found on the street in St. Louis, that there were reports
that Frank was working there (but that he never did gain back his wealth to the same
degree). Apparently there wasn't any identification, but for some reason they contacted
Blanche's brother, Roy Elder, who went and said he didn't know the body so it was buried
in an unmarked paupers grave in St. Louis. He then came home and told Blanche it was
Frank. Before this, or after, I don't know for sure, Blanche had Frank declared legally
dead after not hearing from him for seven years, as was required at the time. She
remarried a couple of times, but one of them didn't last long and the other died shortly
afterwards. She died at 62, a week before she was to retire from being a tool and die
maker, from a heart attack while watching the evening news. She'd been under a lot of
stress and working long hours to get the money together so bills would be paid so she
could retire.
I posted a message on a website asking for information about Frank Meadreau Lambert and
Ranae (Abbott) Eugene replied. We compared histories, which didn't match what I'd been
told by my family at all, other than some names were similar, Frank, Clark (Don/Wayne's
half brother), and Don. She sent me some family photographs, including one of Clark when
he was about 17 y/o with her line of descent, Nellie's son, Frank's sister. Clark looked
very much like my father, but not enough that I was sure it was the right connection. I
showed the picture to my Dad, who said he was sure that it was the correct connection, but
nothing really matched up so I still wasn't sure. However, it was also the only connection
to Frank Lambert that I've ever been able to find, probably because my family had the
history all wrong. When Blanche died she left a fairly large box of photographs with my
dad, which I never knew about. A few years back when I went to the funeral of my Great
Aunt Tootie (who used to take care of me when my dad was overseas and mom worked,
Blanche's sister) I had a chance to talk to the family (having not seen any of them since
I was 16) and get some history. At that time I learned that another of Blanche's sister's
descendant was living in Carthage, MO, which is about 15 min. from me, and they used to
own a large company that was in direct competition with the company I now work for and was
recently bought out by my company, so I was considered 'the enemy'. We had a good laugh
over that. Anyway, she had been given the box of photographs a couple years back b/c my
dad didn't want them. After the contact with Ranae I called/wrote asking for the box, but
she was wintering in Florida, so it took 6 months to get it, along with a family tree
she'd created, but being my grandmother's relative, it didn't contain any information for
my father's side of the family. When I went through the photos I saw the same one of Clark
and Nellie's son that Ranae had sent to me, and other photos of people that looked very
similar to the people in the photos that she had. Given that, I concluded that her story
about family history is accurate and my family's story is pretty much 'made up'. I'm not
surprised by that, my dad's fish size still gets bigger with each telling and my mom can't
really remember much but her own family's history. Interestingly, I have a photograph of
Albert Lambert and his descendants. There is a woman in the picture that I think must be
his wife, but she doesn't look anything like the woman in what is obviously his wedding
photograph. She does, however, look very German! Ranae said something about her
information showing a different name for Albert's wife than the one on the website, so we
speculate that he may have had two.
I think Ranae said most of her information was gained from Hart's website. She hasn't been
able to trace very much of her family either and is waiting for me to get my genealogy
program together and input it all, then send her a copy. I'd planned to go up to Cleveland
last spring to share photographs with her, but vehicle problems prevented it. I still plan
to do that next year as my oldest daughter is living just outside Indianapolis now.
According to her, Frank's father manufactured copper piping in Cleveland and made a
fortune. His father's family is all from that area, and Frank was originally a salesman
for the company which is what took him to Chicago. Interestingly, my ex-husband's family
is all from around Dayton/Cleveland, Ohio, and are German. I have a photograph of a very
young Frank with a very young woman on the steps of a building, and that woman is not
Blanche, but it could be Minnie, Frank's first wife, or it could be his sister, Nellie. I
don't know anything about Minnie or her family. Frank met Blanche who was working as a
sales girl at Macy or something like that (this is from Blanche's version). He divorced
Minnie, married Blanche and two years later had Donald, then 2 years later had Wayne, then
a few years later the stock market crashed. My dad remembers going to the lake house as a
baby. There are photos of Frank/Blanche/Don the baby with boats (my dad has had a lifelong
love of boats, once owning 4 at the same time - I wonder if this is where it started?),
cars, tents at the lake (and a house, looks like they were building one as it grew in size
with various photos from the tent to a house and there's photos of the inside fairly
empty) with lots of other folks. Dad remembers they stayed in a smaller house and they
used to go over to the bigger house to see people. Ranae says Frank's father's lake house
was also at the same lake in Chicago. Ranae said Nellie's son used to hang with his cousin
Clark [Minnie and Frank's son] and they were best friends growing up. This may explain why
Blanche/Frank weren't all that welcomed into the family get togethers, although my dad
remembers seeing lots of family at the lake, which is surprising since he'd had to have
been younger than 5.
My dad remembers visiting Clark in Hollywood when my Dad was about 25 y/o, where Clark was
an actor/producer with some success according to my Dad's description of his house that
they went to. He only met with him that one time, although they did write sporadically for
a bit. My dad was overseas flying planes at night during most of this time. Ranae found a
Clark Lambert that died in Florida with the same name and roughly the dates match, but
neither of us has found a way to verify that he's the correct Clark Lambert.
Interestingly, Hollywood folks were retiring to that part of Florida at that time; they
had a whole community there. Clark never married or had children, according to both my dad
and Ranae's family history. There's also photos of Don the baby outside a house that looks
like a city house, townhouse style, and Wayne as a baby. Frank always has a big ole cigar
in the photos, and a Panama hat. Several nice cars also. Photos stop about that time, then
don't pick up for about 20 years. A few of Blanche and her family are in-between there,
but none of the boys. Blanche had done the typical bride thing and put all the early
photos in books in sequence, but no labels. Many of those had come out of the books and I
need to figure out which ones go where and put them back in. They tell a story in
pictures. I can't imagine my dad not valuing them. I think he didn't see the story behind
the photos.
She also writes these comments:
So I will get my family tree together and get you all a copy. I have to go back and dig
out documents and piece the whole thing together, so it will take me some time. It is most
interesting to find this wealth of information about my father's family. I had thought to
go through my whole life never knowing anything. Matter of fact, I didn't know I had any
German blood at all. It thought I was Irish/Scots and French. One of my daughters has very
similar nose/facial bone structure as the girls in the pictures of the 3 girls on the web
site. I always wondered where it came from as it doesn't look anything like either my
family or my ex-husband's family. Anything you want to share is MOST appreciated as I have
no more knowledge than what I've already imparted. I love hearing the history of how we
all came to be.
It is so wonderful all that you all have done to get this together. It's so interesting to
hear all this information. I'll also make sure Ranae knows everything. I'm sure she will
want to make sure her stuff is accurate also.
WOW!!! I am so thrilled!
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