A Family Rebuilt
After the death of her husband, Lewis Barney, from pneumonia in 1908, Anna Barney faced the difficult challenge of raising three young children on her own. Clara, born in 1898, Charles, born in 1900, and Lee, born in 1903, were still very young when their father died. With few options available and needing time to rebuild her life, Anna made the heartbreaking decision to place the children in the Troy Orphan Asylum in Troy, New York, while she worked to regain stability.
Despite the hardships, Anna remained connected to her family. In 1909 she traveled to Garnet Lake, New York, to visit her father, likely seeking both comfort and support during one of the most difficult periods of her life.
By 1911, Anna had begun rebuilding her future. She married Seaford Reynolds in Johnsburg, New York, hoping to provide a more stable home for herself and her children. Over the next several years, the family slowly reunited. According to the 1915 census, Clara and Lee were living with Anna and Seaford Reynolds in the Town of Sand Lake in Rensselaer County, New York. Charles, however, was living back in Johnsburg with his uncle, Fred Ross, showing how extended family members stepped in to help raise the children during uncertain times.
The family’s situation appears to have changed again by 1920. Anna was then living in Johnsburg with her brother Lester and her son Charles. It is believed that she and Seaford Reynolds may have separated or divorced sometime before then, as Seaford remarried in 1923. During this same period, Lee Barney was working as a servant in the household of Noble Armstrong at Garnet Lake, an indication that he had begun making his own way in the world at a young age.
In 1923, Lee married Antonia Heinz in Bakers Mills, New York, beginning a new chapter for the Barney family. Five years later, in 1928, Lee and Antonia purchased a home on Feeder Dam Road in South Glens Falls, New York, establishing roots and creating a home of their own after years marked by hardship, separation, and perseverance.
The story of Anna and her children reflects the struggles many families faced in the early twentieth century—loss, poverty, separation, and the reliance on extended family and community support. Yet it is also a story of resilience, as each member of the family worked toward building stability and a better future for the next generation.