Brenda Lee Kennedy

Ms. Brenda Lee Hardiman Kennedy passed away on Friday, December 17, 2021.  The Celebration of Life Services will be held on Saturday, January 8, 2022, 11:00 a.m. at Mt. Pleasant Missionary Baptist Church, 2002 N. Rome Ave., Tampa, FL 33607, with Rev. Dr. C.T. Kirkland, officiating. MASKS REQUIRED. Interment to follow in Rest Haven Memorial Park.

Brenda was born on March 28, 1944, the daughter of Mary (Hardiman) Turner in Danville, Illinois. She attended the public schools of Danville.  She later met and married Jimmy A. Kennedy and spent years raising her two children and being a military wife.  Brenda worked many years in California with disabled young adults teaching them skills so they could learn to live independently.  She loved all children and believed with education, structure, and love they all could cross the bridge to that place called ‘success.’  She not only encouraged and demanded the best from her children, but if you spent time with her children, you were automatically included in whatever blessings/punishment that was being dealt out. Today, many of those same kids consider her to be their second mom and grieve her passing along with her biological children. Brenda relocated to Tampa in 1993 and, not long thereafter, became employed at the Tampa Lighthouse for the Blind where she worked until she became ill. She was a faithful member of the Mount Pleasant Missionary Baptist Church where she loved and worked with the Children’s Church ministry until illness prevented her from doing so. 

Brenda was preceded in death by her husband, Jimmy A. Kennedy; mother, Mary Hardiman Turner; stepfather, John Turner, Sr.; brother, John Turner II; special cousin, Karen E. Turner; special aunt, Wanda Trice; and her grandmother, Omie.

She leaves to cherish her memory, son, Jerry Kennedy (Judy) of Oakland, California; daughter, Jackie Kennedy Hall of Tampa, Florida; grandchildren, Ashley Armstrong, Hailey Hall, Alexis Kennedy and Samuel Kennedy; loving and devoted sister, Marva McGuire of Phoenix, Arizona; sister-in-law, Karren Turner (Emery) of Champaign, Illinois; nephews, Michael McGuire, Tenoa McGuire, Christopher McGuire, and John Turner III; special cousins, Katie Trice Floyd, Mary Ann Agnew and Jacquelyn Trice; The Mount Pleasant Missionary Baptist Church Family of Tampa, Florida; special friend, Christine Varco of Detroit, Michigan; her earthly angel, Renee Simms; and a host of adopted children, great-nephews and nieces, cousins and very dear friends.

Visitation will be held on Friday, January 7, 2022, from 4:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at Ray Williams Funeral Home, 301 N. Howard Avenue, Tampa, FL 33606. MASKS RECOMMENDED.

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