Pamela Kennedy Harris

Pamela Evelyn Kennedy-Harris, originally of Wethersfield, CT, passed away suddenly in her home in Missoula, MT on January 7th, 2022. She was 74.

Born in 1947 in Middletown, CT to Robert and Frances Kennedy, Pam was an outgoing student who became Captain of her high school cheerleading squad and was voted Homecoming Queen of Wethersfield High School.

Pam graduated from UConn with a B.A. in English. There, she met and soon married James C Harris. They settled in Wethersfield and had three children: Jason, Kevin and Correy. Pam loved watching her children participate in sports and endured hundreds of hours of boring track meets, watching her children run in a circle. Now that her children are grown with children of their own, they appreciate what a sacrifice this was.

She briefly held jobs with the Wethersfield School District and Trinity College before going back to school to get a degree in Medical Assisting so she could work in the Asthma/Allergy field.

Those who knew Pam best enjoyed her wicked sense of humor and generous spirit. She loved her children (and later, grandchildren) fiercely, had an epic sweet tooth (enjoying a near-nightly Carvel ice cream cone), and could probably best be described as a gardening, bird-watching, nature-loving woman ahead of her time.

“You’ll never know until you try - you can’t be scared your whole life” is the advice she’d later give to her grandchildren as they set out into the world, and Pam believed strongly in chasing your dreams. Post-divorce, at the age of 51, she read a novel set in the Bitterroot Mountains of western Montana and decided to pack her bags and see them for herself. On the last day of her solo vacation, she rented a house; Montana was now her home.

Pam convinced her daughter Correy to move to Montana, and was able to enjoy the last decades of her life assisting at Correy’s preschool, working with the students who all knew her as “Grandma Pam.”

Pam’s children take solace in knowing she has crossed the rainbow bridge to be reunited with her beloved mother and all the dogs she adopted over the course of her incredible life.

She was preceded in death by her brother James Kennedy, and is survived by her sisters Sandra Kilburn (Brian), and Deborah Williams (Kieran), her brother John Kennedy, her children Jason R Harris (Jess), Kevin C. Harris, and Correy M. Harrison (Greg), her grandchildren Correy R., Mia and Justin Harris and Abby and Dylan Harrison, and her loving dog, Willy.

In lieu of funeral services, the family will have a private ceremony in Pam’s beloved Bitterroot Mountains. Donations in Pamela Kennedy-Harris’s name can be made to the Humane Society of Western Montana.