Fayne Weant

10/16/1922 - 02/05/2014

Fayne Weant passed away peacefully in Santa Cruz, CA with her husband, Edward, by her side. She was born in Ft. Pierre, S.Dak. and raised on a ranch on the Missouri River in Stanley County, S.Dak. Her parents were members of the Ft. Pierre Congregational Church and it was while Rev. James Davis was beginning his ministerial career there in 1938 that he met a beautiful girl with an infectious laugh. It would be years before they met again. Jim was called up as a Lt. in the Navy to Guam where he was captured by the Japanese in 1941 and spent the remainder of the war in a POW camp in Japan. Fayne, meanwhile, continued her education at Santa Ana Junior College in CA and the University of Colorado in Boulder, where she received a teaching degree in History. Upon being released in October of 1945, Chaplain Davis returned to Ft. Pierre, where Fayne had been teaching and married her in the same church they had met 5 years previously. They were soon sent to San Diego, CA where James began his post-war assignments with the Naval Chaplain's Corps. Their first two children were born on Navy bases and their third after Jim left the Navy for a preaching position in Bisbee, AZ. Fayne worked as a teacher while they also owned and operated several small businesses, including an apartment complex in Tucson, AZ, a laundromat in Douglas, WY and a drive-in restaurant in Bakersfield, CA. Fayne proved to be an excellent businesswoman and ran a tight ship, both at work and at home.
Following the deaths in quick succession of her husband, Jim, in 1985, her mother in 1987 and her beloved son, Curt, in 1989, Fayne retired from Bakersfield City Schools and relocated to San Luis Obispo, CA. She became a member of the Methodist Church where she met Edward Weant and fell in love for the second time. They were married in 1995 and decided to make their home in La Mesa, CA where they quickly became active in the United Church of Christ and local Senior Center activities. They spent time visiting friends and family and traveling throughout this country and abroad. In 2006, when they started having some health problems, Fayne and Ed moved to Fresno, CA to be nearer Fayne's daughter. Fayne was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease in 2008 and 'moved' to Somerford Place where she 'taught the staff to dance'! During their 18 years together, Fayne and Ed made a scholarship endowment to the Education Department of her alma mater, CU and a donation toward a hospice wing of the hospital in Pierre, SD, in memory of her parents, Frank & Muriel Kirley. Fayne couldn't have asked for two more happy and fulfilling marriages.
Fayne was preceded in death by her beloved youngest son, Curt, her parents, Frank & Muriel Kirley, and her brother, Joseph Kirley. She is survived by her loving husband, Edward, her daughter Dinah and partner, Sally, all from Santa Cruz, CA, son Frank and wife Sandi, grandchildren Emerald and Jared Yorke and Jedidiah Davis, all of Ft. Wayne, IN, grandchildren Lance and wife Tracye, Scott Randolph and fiancee Melissa Benson and former son-in-law Ken Randolph, all of Bakersfield and Mellow and Thoger Lund and Paula Randolph of AZ. She will also be missed by her great-grandchildren, Scout, Wyatt, Baltazar, Aerilyn, Sabatian, and Alabama as well as many nieces, nephews and cousins.
A viewing at 10:00am followed by a service at 11:00am will be held on Feb. 13th at the First Congregational Church of Bakersfield on 5 Real Road at Stockdale Hwy. Interment will be at the Greenlawn Cemetery SW on 2739 Panama Lane at Hwy. 99.