Nancy J. Weir Boyd

biography

Mrs. Robert B. Boyd 

Nancy J. Weir was born at Adamsville, Crawford County, Pa., in 1831. She died at Mercer. Pa., Saturday, Sept. 11, 1926, and was buried the following Monday from the Methodist Church in Mercer. The interment was in Coolspring.

When two years of age she was brought by her parents— Mr. and Mrs. John Weir, to Coolspring Township, Mercer County, where she grew to womanhood. In 1857 she was married to Robert B. Boyd, a member of the Erie Conference, and they had as their first appointment Pine Grove, now Grove City.

Robert Boyd died at Brookville, Pa., March 30th, 1876. Thus it appears that Mrs. Boyd had been a widow more than fifty years. During these fifty years her home had been in Mercer and in the house where she died. Soon after Brother Boyd’s death the widow brought her family to Mercer, near the neighborhood where her early life was spent, and where her husband was converted in 1850, and where their married life began. It is said of him that he “died with the harness on.” They were true team-mates pulling evenly on the load assigned them by the church.

Mrs. Boyd was a real gentlewoman. “Blood tells,” people say. And it does, more or less, and here is one of the multitudinous cases where the blood of Calvary loudly proclaims in character product “If we walk in the light as He is in the light we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ His Soil cleanseth us from all sin.” To say she had graciousness, faithfulness, gentility, motherly nobility, Christlikeness is no overstatement, and of this her nearest neighbors would be most willing witnesses. 

In the fifty years of her residence at Mercer a long list of pastors have proved her faithfulness. She never willingly failed the King or hindered the coming of the Kingdom. Rather, she steadily contributed to the progress of the work of God in the community in which she lived, doing her best and helping others to do their best. She was rich in the anticipation for the future,—the Father’s house, the rest, the welcome, the loved ones waiting her.

Mrs. Boyd was in an enfeebled condition for many months before her home-going, but to the last, glad, strong, expectant and triumphant.

Mrs. Boyd is survived by three daughters—Mrs. Charles E. Amberson, of Superior, Neb.; Mrs. James A. Lawrie, Duluth, Minn.; and Mrs. Walter D. Spaulding, Detroit, Mich. Besides these, an adopted daughter, Mrs. John H. Baer, of Mercer, survives.

In utmost tenderness these daughters eased the way down to the last smiling farewell, and their inheritance is a glorious memory.