Irene LaVerne Garnett

Irene LaVerne Garnett was born to the union of Winfield A. and Irene Brown Garnett on October 10, 1928. The third child and only girl of four, Irene lost both of her parents while still a teenager. For the next several years, Irene joined with her older brothers, Thomas and Winfield, to finish raising their youngest brother, Vincent.

Irene spent her life as a proud Evanstonian. She graduated from Foster School in 1942 and Evanston Township High school four years later. She joined Evanston’s Second Baptist Church during her teenage years under the late Pastor J. Gentry Horace. As a teenager, Irene played the piano for the Baptist Young People’s Union on Sunday evenings. In her later years, Irene was the Church Clerk during the pastoral of Rev. Dr. Hycel B. Taylor.

Soon after her graduation from high school, Irene began a 39-year career with the federal government. She started by working for the Veterans Administration, but after one year, began working for the Social Security Administration as a file clerk. Throughout her years, she rose through the ranks and retired as a level 13 analyst. One of the professional accomplishments Irene was most proud of was her work as an investigator for the Equal Employment Operations Union, where she examined cases of discrimination filed against the Social Security Administration. The first case she investigated resulted in the claimant winning the case.

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