Remembering Pamela Sweet Kenyon Cardin - Descendant of the Richardson-Arnold families

Pamela Sweet Kenyon
Class of '69

I have been meaning to write a post about my friend Pam for some time now. Honestly, it's been very difficult for me to find the words to share with the world just what a wonderful and true friend she was to me. I hope that by reading this post about my dear friend, that you will get to see just what a kind and caring person she was, and how much her family history meant to her.

First off, I didn't meet Pam until after I had done my research into the Conjuring House, debunking the false lore surrounding Bathsheba Sherman. In fact, I recall when I first met Norma Sutcliffe over 10 years ago, after she had provided me with information regarding the house, a few of the notes from Norma was email correspondence between herself and Pam.

Of course at that time I didn't want to just write her out of the blue and ask her questions, when I was literally a stranger. So, one day when I happened to be commenting on a Facebook post about the false history surrounding the Conjuring House, I noticed Pam had commented, too. I immediately took the opportunity to introduce myself and share with her my interest in sharing the truth about the house, which happened to be her ancestral home. We immediately hit it off, and became good friends shortly thereafter.

It was amazing to keep in touch with her for the few years that I knew her, getting to hear first hand about her memories at her grandparent's home, her research of her family genealogy and other stories surrounding the property and Burrillville itself, not to mention her family's opinion of the Perron family. With Pam's blessing, I started this blog "Deconstructing The Conjuring," to share the history to the best of my ability surrounding the genealogy of the families that lived on the farm, the history of the house itself, the stories of different owners who have lived there over the years, and everything else associated with the property, such as the false story behind Bathsheba Sherman.  My hope with this blog, which is a work-in-progress, was to share factual research surrounding this subject with the help of Pam, of course.

Over the time that we communicated, it was obvious she suffered from multiple health problems as she shared that she had developed Type 1 Diabetes in her early 50s, survived a diabetic coma, and was also breast cancer survivor, too. It was clear that Pam was a survivor, not a quitter; So, never in my wildest dreams did I imagine she would be taken from this earth so quickly. I have been very broken up about the loss of my friend for some time now, and that is one reason why I hadn't posted about her until today. 

Pamela Sweet Kenyon was born on July 8, 1951 in Harrisville, Rhode Island, to parents Earl Kenyon, Jr., and Marjorie Sweet Kenyon. Her grandparents, Sarah Butterworth and Earl Kenyon, Sr., owned and lived in the house on Round Top Road, where Pam's father also grew up. As a child Pam used to stay over at her grandparent's home and she loved visiting the farmhouse, and learning about her family history from her grandmother. 

Interestingly, Pam's ancestry on both sides were pioneer families local to the area. Not only did she descend from the Butterworth/Arnold/Richardson families who owned the farm the longest, but her mother's side of the family, the Sweet's, were also very well known throughout Burrillville/Harrisville area historically. Pamela attended school in town and was a graduate of Burrilville High School, class of '69. 

Pam is sitting on the 2nd row, 2nd seat (middle of photo) 

She also attended college and became an English teacher, and later on an Special Education teacher and she also along with her cousin, Joyce Remington McKenna studied to be a certified genealogist. She married Rick Cardin, and had daughter, Rhiannon (b. 1982) and son, Brian (b. 1984).  Pam loved her children so very much, and she often told me how difficult life was for her after losing her son, who passed away suddenly after an illness.

Besides the love she had for her family, Pam absolutely loved animals. If you knew her on social media, you would see she would often post about dogs and cats and her love for them, especially horses! She was big on horse riding when she was younger, and even rode in horse shows. She shared a photo of herself when she was child stating: 

"My two steadfast best buddies for most of my childhood -- Dusty, the pony with the iron mouth  and Rover, my father's collie who was my protector throughout most of my childhood. One vet thought Dusty was about 40 when he died. He was blind in one eye but that didn't stop him at all."--

It was clear by Pam's interest, she had a kind soul, but she also had an undying passion for history of her hometown.  As one of the founding members of the Burrillville Historical Society, Pam named their newsletter "The Historian," when she was the editor between 1982-1998. She also acted as secretary to the historical society for a time as well. 

Per Betty at the Historical Society, and their March 2024, "The Historian" newsletter, "Pam was always generous; she donated part of the former Sweet's Hill property to the Society to sell in order to raise (much-needed) funds. It was sold for about $9,000 to DEM and is now part of Black Hut Management Area. Early in 2008, Pam sold her house on Sweet's Hill and moved to Florida. Before she left, she let the Society scan her entire collection of Sweet's Hill photos and donated artifacts from the farm and several large framed photos. She also donated a whole room full of books which started out tradition of having book sales."--

In one of our email exchanges to one another Pam mentioned to me that although she was living in the south, the south was just not for her. She missed her home, and the only place she really considered home was Rhode Island. She often commented on her memories of living up there and wished she was back there, back to that time period, back to that place. It was obvious that the best memories of her life were in Burrillville, and her heart ached because of it. 

I never found out what exactly happened, as I knew she had taken a bad fall in November of 2023, and after that she stopped posting on social media and I never heard from her, and she never responded to any of my emails or letters. Eventually, I got the news no one ever wants to hear, that she had passed away in December of 2023.  

I wanted to honor her on this blog, since she was the inspiration for me to create it in the first place. I had already debunked the nonsense surrounding Bathsheba Sherman's false history that the Warrens and Perron family have perpetuated in the film, "The Conjuring," and the books "House of Darkness, House of Light," but with Pam, we were going to delve even deeper into the history of the home, the history of the families who lived there and expose the truth for the world to see -- that his house is just an old farm house that several families considered "Home Sweet Home," just the way Pam saw it.

Rest In Peace My Friend. --

Courtesy: Burrillville Historical Society

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