Adella R. Harmon

For more than six decades, Adella Harmon was a teacher, librarian, wife, mother, grandmother, and tireless supporter of her family. Whether helping establish an elementary school library, cheering from the stands at a school event, or gathering her family around the dinner table at the end of the day, she devoted her life to helping others learn, grow, and thrive.

Adella passed away peacefully on August 19, 2026, at the Cheney Golden Age Home, at the age of 91.

Born in Goessel, Kansas, Adella was the second of nine children born to Theodore and Helen. She grew up on the family farm near Goessel, surrounded by a large and close-knit family that valued faith, education, hard work, and service to others. Alongside her siblings Joanne, Ted, Leon, Heleen, Nadine, Kermit, Rose, and Arylis, she learned lessons about responsibility, perseverance, and caring for others that would guide her throughout her life.

On August 4, 1959, she married James J. Harmon in Goessel’s Alexanderwohl Mennonite Church. Their wedding day was remembered as one of the hottest days anyone could recall, with temperatures reportedly reaching 105 degrees, though Adella herself rarely made much of it. What mattered most was the life that followed. Together, she and Jim built a marriage that spanned nearly sixty-four years and a partnership rooted in love, mutual respect, family, faith, farming, and education.

Education was not simply Adella's profession; it was one of her gifts. She began her career teaching home economics and later continued teaching while Jim completed his education. During the family's years in Rolla, Kansas, she completed studies in library science and discovered the work that would define much of her professional life. After returning to Cheney in 1969, she helped establish the elementary school library and eventually became its full-time librarian. For twenty-nine years, generations of Cheney students were welcomed into a place where books, curiosity, and learning were valued. She retired from USD 268 in 2000, the same year Jim retired after thirty-one years of teaching mathematics. Together they devoted six decades of service to the students and families of their community.

While Adella was proud of her work in education, her family was always her greatest priority. She and Jim raised three children, Kimberly, Marcel, and Chandra, while carrying the heartbreak of losing an infant daughter in 1966. Home was a place of activity, laughter, occasional mishaps, and enduring love. There were school programs, sporting events, music performances, church activities, home renovations, 4-H projects, summer wheat harvests, the occasional family vacation, and countless ordinary moments that became treasured memories. Her children remember parents who rarely missed an event, encouraged curiosity, and supported their children even when that meant long drives, busy schedules, and plenty of patience.

Adella was not someone who sought attention for herself. Her influence was found in quieter ways: helping a child discover a favorite book, supporting a struggling student, encouraging a family member, caring for a home, or simply being present when someone needed her. She believed in learning, valued relationships, and understood that a meaningful life is built through daily acts of service and kindness. Those who knew her remember her as thoughtful, dependable, practical, and deeply caring.

Her legacy lives on through the family she loved, the students she encouraged, the readers she inspired, and the example she set. She leaves behind a family strengthened by her devotion, shaped by her values, and enriched by a lifetime of her love.

Adella was preceded in death by her husband, James J. Harmon, an infant daughter, and siblings Joanne, Leon, and Arylis.

She is survived by her children (and their spouses), Kimberly Ligon (Joel), Marcel Harmon (Michelle), and Chandra Gordon (Rob); her grandchildren; her remaining siblings; and many nieces, nephews, former students, friends, and community members who were blessed by her life. We will miss her.

Funeral services will be at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, October 16, 2026, at Trinity United Christian Church, 416 Washington Street, Cheney, Kansas. Burial took place on August 21, 2026 at Haviland Cemetery with Adella’s children and grandchildren present.

Memorials may be made to Cheney Public Library in care of Livingston Funeral Home, 1830 N. Main, Kingman KS 67068.