The Life and Times of Pamela Smith Ingram
Born: January 14, 1951, • Born Again: December 2, 1976, • Entered Heaven: November 29, 2022
Pamela Kay Smith Ingram was born on January 14, 1951, to Alice Richardson Smith and Rev. Jesse C. Smith Jr. at the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City, KS. Pam’s family lived in T. B. Watkins’s public housing in Kansas City, MO throughout her elementary and high school years. Pam often boasted that her family “did two stints in public housing!” She describes her parents as the “working poor” because her dad always had a job, and typically, two or three! Her mother was a professional seamstress and hairdresser who managed her two successful businesses out of their tiny, third-floor apartment in the projects. Pam grew up surrounded by beautiful fabrics, Vogue patterns, buttons, and bling and, because of that, Pam and all three sisters had a lifelong passion for fashion and “cute shoes!” The Smith girls all attended St. Joseph Catholic Church and the church’s school until they transferred to public schools.
Pam attended and graduated from Lincoln High School (now “Lincoln College Prep Academy”) where she was a member of the Future Business Leaders of America Club and the French Club — the club that sparked her lifelong passion for all things French, especially the language! She marveled at the day “Little Pamela from the Projects” found herself staring up at “La Tour Eiffel” in Paris!
Throughout high school as well as during her freshman year at UMKC, she worked at Southwestern Bell Telephone Company. She began college as an English major, but eventually switched to journalism when she transferred to the University of Missouri in Columbia; she assumed that most English majors teach children, and back then, she often professed, “I don’t like children!”
It was during her final semester at the Journalism School that she met the love of her life on a blind date: Ellis Andrew Ingram!! During one of the many telephone calls from his friends who kept insisting that “You and Ellis would be so good together!” called to entice Pam to go out with their friend and said, “You’ll really like him… he’s a doctor!” She was unimpressed! “Soooo what? …I’m a writer!”
What did impress her, though, was the way he talked, non-stop about how much he loved his dad on their first official date. Hour after hour, he sprinkled his conversation with anecdotal stories about his dad, John Wesley Ingram Sr. In college, she didn’t actually know anyone who still even “liked” their parents, so his boasting about his dad caught Pam’s attention.
A year later on November 26, 1975, Pam and Ellis found themselves standing before Judge Ellen Roper at the Boone County Courthouse promising to love and honor each other for the rest of their lives. And they did! Because they thought “witnesses” were only seen in those old black-and-white western movies, they didn’t take any to the courthouse that day. Nor did the older teen couple who’d shown up to get married the same day. The two couples signed up for each other and never saw each other again! Over the years, Ellis and Pam had four children: Tiffani Ingram Smith, Candace Kauffman, Maestro Michael Ellis Ingram, Christina Eileen Ingram; and grandchildren, Mahogany Bell, Jamila Raynor, Alexandra, and Tyson Smith, and William Grady Ellis Ingram; two great-grandchildren, Jaxon, and Adeline Bell.
Throughout her first pregnancy and for months after Tiffani’s birth, Pam started experiencing unsettling dreams and stirrings in her heart that provoked her to question the purpose of life and, for the first time, realized just how far from God she was. She often found herself asking, “How do I get all this sin out and God in?”
After a year and a half of daily crying out to God, she finally heard the life-transforming message of the Gospel while watching Christian television. She could hardly believe that Jesus’s death on the cross paid for every single one of her sins… past, present, and future! — total forgiveness plus an intimate relationship with the Lord that would last throughout eternity. This all seemed just too good to be true! That revelation thrilled her heart then and continued to spark a passion for God’s Word and His purposes throughout her life; a passion that fueled decades of joy-filled ministry which included mentoring the girls involved in Mizzou’s Spirit-Filled Student Miniseries and taking the girls on annual prayer retreats; launching a door-to-door prayer ministry “FreePrayer,” that sent teams door to door to pray for the families in public housing; ministry to women incarcerated at the Renz Correctional Center for Women in Jefferson City and mentoring young women through Boone County Resource Mothers. She often found herself being the “unofficial” doula for several pregnant teens during their labor and delivery. That’s how she met Gredia Bell, whose newborn, “Miss Mimi” became Ingram’s very first grandchild and, according to Pam, “…changed my life forever!”
In 2001 she founded the after-school ministry, Granny’s House where she served as Executive Director for nearly 22 years — the ministry she called her “full-time, overtime, 6-day-a-week-volunteer job,” because she would not take a salary. Pam also spent several years as a freelance feature writer for Inside Columbia Magazines. The Ingrams have been members of Christian Fellowship Church for more than forty years where she taught second-graders in Kingdom Kids, helped lead small groups, taught eighth-grade English and Reading at Christian Fellowship School, and, more recently, co-lead the church’s Anticipating Antioch Class and the Oneness Team with Ellis along with Nathan and Lisa Buxman.
Pam adored her children and grandchildren and loved hanging out with them! Because of her many hobbies, she loved creating beautiful things for her family and friends. For several years, her custom jewelry was sold at Bingham’s Fine Clothing and Poppy Gift Shops in downtown Columbia. She began crocheting at the age of five and continued creating custom clothing and gift items for her children, grandchildren, and friends throughout her life.
Her favorite hobby, however, was traveling, especially her annual “Smith Sisters Getaways” on the Isle of Palms near Charleston, S.C. Every year, Pam and her sisters turned into a bunch of giggly little girls as they hung out together on the beach, usually pretending that the “Cute Little Beach House” they rented every year as part of the inheritance they’d received from their Daddy (who, coincidentally, was a maintenance man for most of his life). Pam loved traveling to Germany to visit their son, Maestro Michael, and going on mission trips to Hong Kong, Puerto Rico, and Russia, and visits to European cities; however, her all-time favorite vacation spots were, Victoria BC on Vancouver Island, and Paris. She and Ellis loved the “treasure hunt” of discovering a church to attend in every country they visited. It was not unusual for Pam to return home from one of those trips with a brand new “best friend!”
Pam was proceeded in death by her parents Reverend Jesse C. Smith Jr. and Alice Juanita Richardson Smith, both her maternal and paternal grandparents, and her sister, Janice Hood.
Friends will be received Friday, December 9, 2022, from 11:00 am to 12:30 pm at Christian Fellowship Church, 5045 Chapel Hill Rd, Columbia, Missouri 65203. Funeral services will begin immediately following visitation at 12:30 pm at Christian Fellowship Church. Burial will be private for immediate family at Columbia Cemetery in Columbia, Missouri.
Arrangements are under the direction of Parker-Millard Funeral Service & Crematory, 12 East Ash Street, Columbia, MO 65203 (573) 449-4153. Condolences may be left online for the family at www.parkermillard.com.