Harold Lyness Bowyer

Father: Robert Pembrook Bowyer (1863-1943) Mother: Mary Josephine Lyness (1871-1921) Born August 27, 1902, at Wright, Ford County, Kansas. Died January 26, 1982, at Las Vegas, Clark County, Nevada. Harold Lyness ("Tom") Bowyer was the first-born of the three sons of Pem and Josie. He assumed the name Tom when he was about seven years old, after a well-liked cowboy and family friend, who had that name. Tom helped build the family home in Kansas and the adobe home in Colorado. As the oldest boy, his help was needed on the farm, and he left school after the third grade. After his mother died, when he was nineteen, he worked on a ranch, and achieved success with the catching, breaking, and training of wild horses. He joined the rodeo circuit for a while.

While healing from a rodeo injury, he became a helper for the chuck-wagon cook, and this started him on his lifetime profession of cook. He eventually became a Master Chef.

Tom met his second wife, Mary, while working at the Grand Canyon as an apprentice chef. She was working as a waitress. They were married in 1939, and settled in California, where he was studying to be a chef. In 1940, he was voted into the honorary position of Chefs Cuisine in Los Angeles. Their only child, a daughter named Nancy Ann, was born there in 1942.

In 1960, the family moved to Las Vegas, where Tom worked as chef at the Four Queens Hotel and Casino. Later, he helped open the El Dorado, where he served as chef until he retired in 1970. He suffered from Parkinson's Disease the last ten years of his life.

Spouse: Beulah Magee (1910-)

Spouse2: Mary Agnes (Annie) Kelly (1910-1989)

Child:

1. F Nancy Ann Bowyer (1942-)