BRANDON — A couple of weeks ago, we took a look at the history of the house in Brandon where William Chambers lived around the turn of the century. It turns out that this wasn’t the first time we’ve talked about the Chambers family in the History Knox column.
Current family descendent Kathy Chambers contacted me to give more background on the house, plus to remind me of our earlier encounter with her family’s history.
Back in 2019, we ran a story about the tombstone of Rachel Chambers being found in the basement of The Office bar when it was torn down. It turns out that the stone had been used in the building of that structure after a new family gravestone was placed in Mound View Cemetery, where Rachel, her husband Benjamin, and their son William are buried.
Benjamin was the son of Benjamin Chambers, Sr., and Rachel appears to have been a daughter of Captain Joseph Walker, one of the earliest settlers of the Knox County area.
Kathy fills in the early history: “Benjamin and Rachel Chambers were married in 1826 and built [a] house at that time [on Blackjack Road]. It is a timber frame construction house. James was born there in 1828.
Before retiring from farming and moving to Brandon, he married Mary Fishburn in 1856 and built a Victorian cottage style house at 6687 Sharp Road. They raised three children, William, Rosa and Elmer.
Family stories tell me they first lived in his grandfather’s log house before building the Victorian cottage.
“Because of James Chambers’ poor health, he, Mary and son William moved to Brandon around 1896. The Chambers land holdings had grown over the years. Elmer had married Margaret (Maggie) Shannon and purchased a farm near his parents on Sharp Road.
“Rosa married Price Jennings and purchased a farm on Sharp Road. One of her descendants, Mark Hunter, still lives on a small portion of her farm. Family stories were that William, a.k.a. Billy, and Cora Effie Litt were divorced. The references of William Chambers owning the land on Blackjack Road was Billy’s Uncle William, James younger brother. Uncle William died in 1904.
“The Chambers family had around 500 acres on Sharp, Jennings and Blackjack Roads. Sadly, only Rosa was interested in farming. William loved to travel. He worked on the farm, but traveling was his passion. He had an aunt in Iowa that he loved to visit. (I still have his traveling trunks.) He attended the Chicago World’s Fair.
“The stress of farming led to Elmer’s emotional collapse. He was a successful farmer, but the stress was unbearable. He, Maggie, and son, James, moved to a small farm at 1000 Newark Road in Mount Vernon. He subdivided the farm. On property legal descriptions the area of Ames Street, east of Newark Road, is known as Chambers addition. He also invested in rental properties.
“After Mary died in 1916, Billy moved to Mount Vernon to be closer to Elmer. He lived at 812 South Main Street.”
Many thanks to Kathy for the further information about the Chambers family and the wealth of family photos!
