If you asked Kathy Leighton almost anything about far East Contra Costa County history, she knew the answer — not just a date but a bevy of colorful details. The longtime historian, author and community leader, who worked tirelessly for decades to preserve the area’s history, died on Saturday following a long illness at her beloved Byron home.
Leighton, who over the years served on many town boards and commissions, was two days short of her 76th birthday and had been ill for more than a year. But before that, she could be found working long hours in Brentwood at the East Contra Costa Historical Society Museum’s resource center, which was dedicated in her name. For all her efforts, she was named California Legislature Woman of the Year in 2001.
“It was like she knew everything,” said museum volunteer Dennis Nunn. “You’d ask her a question and she’d immediately know the answer.”
A former newspaper history columnist, Leighton knew so much trivia about her small town and neighboring Brentwood, Oakley, Knightsen and Bethel Island that she and a friend once published a trivia game with more than 400 question-and-answer cards. And in 2001, the city of Brentwood donated money to the historical society to help her in her yearlong endeavor to produce a 266-page history volume called “Footprints in the Sand,” which was later expanded to 304 with additional stories and photos.
Her family, however, remembers her early days before she set her sights on learning East Contra Costa County’s history.
A fifth-generation Byron resident, Leighton grew up in a farmhouse on the property homesteaded by her great-grandfather John Samuel Armstrong. Her father grazed sheep and cattle, and she and her three siblings would rearrange the hay bales, spending endless hours playing in the barn and nearby fields.
“There were 12 barns, two houses and corrals,” son Barrett Leighton said. “It was quite a setup at one time. There was a summer house and a winter house, and every six months they would move from one house to the other.”
After graduating from Utah State University, she married William Leighton and worked as an estimator for her husband’s grading and paving business in Byron while caring for three children. But she still found time to become heavily involved in the community.
“Ever since we were little kids, she was involved in every community festival or arts festival,” Barrett Leighton said.
Leighton and a friend helped get the annual CornFest off the ground, chairing the festivals in 1992 and 1993, and later helped with the city’s Art and Wine Festival. She also served on the John Marsh Historic Trust, Byron Municipal Advisory Council, the East Bay Regional Parks District board and county Airport Land Use Commission.
While her children were still young, she found time to travel, taking them to all the national parks west of the Mississippi.
“We’d be gone for a month,” Barrett Leighton said. “She’d load us and some of our friends into the car and just drive. Money didn’t matter. If she had $10 or $1,000 in her pocket, she’d find an adventure for us.”
His mother’s doors “were always open,” he said.
“There was nothing that we could ask for that she wouldn’t have done for us,” he said. “She was a great mother, not only to us but to nieces and nephews….She had three children but raised a dozen kids.”
Daughter-in-law Kelly Leighton remembers her mother-in-law’s holiday parties with hundreds of guests where “everyone was welcome.”
“She had the congressman sitting next to the homeless man,” daughter Chantelle Leighton said.
Her mom loved to entertain and often hosted potlucks.
“People would bring what they wanted and if we ended up all eating dessert that night, it was fine with her,” Chantelle Leighton said.
After her children were grown, Leighton developed a new passion – history. It happened while she was helping cousins clear out their late mother’s belongings. Her aunt had been the family historian, and as Leighton sorted through the memorabilia, she found wedding invitations going back three generations and locks of her great-grandmother’s hair.
Her cousins were not interested in saving things but Leighton was.
“My aunt took 65 years to save it. It just seemed like a tragedy to burn it,” she told an East Bay Times reporter in 2012.
The collection — two full barns of boxes — included newspapers and relics of Byron families, so Leighton distributed those keepsakes to their descendants. And she began researching her own family history, including that of her great-great-grandfather, who settled in Byron in 1867 following Ireland’s potato famine.
Eventually, Leighton amassed 30 binders – each four or five inches thick – with a different branch of the family tree. She then began writing columns about pioneer history for the Brentwood News, which became material for her first book, “Footprints in the Sand.”
Over time, more and more local residents would donate mementos, which she stored in a small trailer at the East Contra Costa Historical Society Museum before the 1,600-square foot resource center was opened in 2017.
“She loved all of it,” Kelly Leighton said of the mementos. “Nothing was too little. Everything had meaning.”
Museum volunteers also recalled her love for history.
“Kathy was very instrumental here in building the resource center,” said Doreen Forlow, East Contra Costa Historical Society’s past president. “That was her thing, to collect local history of all of the towns and islands in East Contra Costa County. I would credit her with building this center and collecting much of the information and encouraging people to come here and work.”
The collection includes two porcelain dolls owned by Frances Eustis Donner Wilder, a surviving member of the Donner Party, who settled in Byron in 1866. Leighton convinced her family to donate them.
“You didn’t say no to Kathy,” Forlow said. “She had a way of convincing you that you would want to be a party to a bigger story and that you wished to be a part of that story by donating your family’s treasures.”
Mary Casey Black, current East Contra Costa Historical Society president, added that Leighton always began each meeting with a lively story about local history.
“She was passionate about our local area and all the rich heritage we have here, and she made others love it along with her because she brought it (history) to life,” she said. “She could put history around anything and she shared it in a way that made it personable and relatable.”
Leighton is survived by husband William; daughter Chantelle; sons Barrett and Brandon; brother David Armstrong; sister Anita Pombo; seven grandchildren, two great-grandchildren, and nieces and nephews. A celebration of life is planned for May 21 at the East Contra Costa Historical Society Museum, 3890 Sellers Ave., Brentwood.