Sarah DeForest Hanscom

Adelaide Marquand Hanscom Leeson

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Born November 25, 1877 in Parkersburg, Oregon. Married George Samual Embury May 16, 1906 in Berkeley. Died July 1974.

George Samuel Embury, her husband, was in Alaska. Went when he was a senior in HS. He couldn't stand living with his mother anymore. Up there for 20 years. Took correspondence courses. He was told to court Gertrude Hanscom. Instead he courted Sarah Hanscom and a Miss Lewis. It was Sarah's good cooking and that she was a nurse and would make a good mother. Auntie Mamie Turner (an Embury) was in Alaska too.

She played the piano, but had lost part of her thumb in a childhood boating accident ona trip back to Oregon.

George was very serious—not much humor between Sarah and George. He had a reputation for playing practical jokes on people.

Sarah insisted her daughters go to college. George thought it was a waste. He allowed it, but only would let them major in nursing, education, or home economics.

She graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1899 one among the very few women to do so this early. She played basketball on the Cal team, all 4 feet 11 inches of her.

In this snapshot, Adelaide is in the window of her studio in the back yard of the Walnut street house in Berkeley.