Maxine McCann Wamsley Esham, 93, of Vanceburg, passed away Tuesday in Richmond.
She was a daughter of Fred and Bessie McCann of Quicks Run. She was a graduate of Lewis County High School, class of ’46, and Marinello Beauty School in Cincinnati.
Besides her parents, she is preceded in death by her husband of two years, Harlan Wamsley, and husband of 46 years, Curtis Jackson Esham, son Charles Whitney Wamsley, siblings Loretta (aka Pauline) McCall, Louise Applegate, Halbert (aka Hobb) McCann, Arnold McCann, and Fred McCann.
Surviving are her children Jill (Scott Wood) Esham and Fred (Shell) Esham, grandchildren Charles Whitney Wamsley II, Thomas Blake Wamsley, Kimberly Denise Esham, and Curtis Benjamin Esham, and great-grandchildren Annie and Ava Wamsley.
Maxine was owner and sole proprietor of Maxine’s Beauty Shop of Kinniconick in Lewis County for 35 years. Throughout her life, she worked as a waitress, a black and white photo colorist, factory worker making radio tubes, a beautician, farmer, bus driver, and librarian assistant. As a beautician, she sometimes had to stop in the middle of a hairdo to go get the cows out of the road. She would leave the tobacco stripping room to go make lunch for family and hired hands alike; then go back to the stripping room after cleaning the kitchen. She once broke her back when a hay bale knocked her off a ladder. When her husband, Jack, went overseas to work, she used some of the money to install a bathroom in our old farmhouse and told him about it after it was done. She provided and cared for her children in her own way. She once took a length of rope and tied her daughter to the porch post to keep her out of the road while she was busy in the beauty shop. Child abuse today, good parenting in 1960. Her mother-in-law, Granny Esham, was appalled. She was the talk of the hospital when she gave birth to an 11 lb. 13 oz. baby (the child that was eventually tied to the porch post). Her sense of adventure was fearless, often packing up the kids and heading out to parts unknown. If she got lost along the way, that was just part of the adventure.
Funeral services will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, July 11, 2020, at Dickerson Funeral Home in Vanceburg, Kentucky. Burial will follow in the Lewis County Memory Gardens in Lewis County, Kentucky.
Friends may visit from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. Saturday, July 11, 2020, at Dickerson Funeral Home, 110 West Second Street, Vanceburg, Kentucky 41179.
