"Anne was Scranton": Biden remembers the owner of his childhood home
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Anne Kearns with Joe Biden. Family photo provided by Kim Kingsley
Anne Ratchford Kearns — who lived for 60 years in the Pennsylvania house at the root of President Biden's "Scranton Joe" lore, and hosted him several times when he visited his hometown — died on Christmas Eve at 88.
The big picture: Biden loved to visit the house and schmooze with Kearns when he returned to Scranton, where he was born in 1942.
- He sometimes came with his sister, Valerie Biden Owens, and sometimes with his late mother, Catherine Eugenia Finnegan Biden, known as Jean (who lived to 92!).
- The president lived in Kearns' house from roughly ages 5 to 10.
Then-Vice President Biden hosted Kearns at the White House on St. Patrick's Day in 2010.
- Kearns welcomed Hillary Clinton and Vice President Biden into her kitchen when they stopped in Scranton while she was running for president in 2016.
The Kearns family bought the home for $14,000 in 1962 from Edward Finnegan, Biden's uncle, according to The (Scranton) Times-Tribune, which gave Kearns a front-page sendoff.
Above: "From This House To The White House With the Grace of God," Biden wrote with a Sharpie on Kearns' living-room wall during a stop on election morning in 2020.
- He signed a bedroom wall during his 2008 race for vice president: "I Am Home ... Joe Biden." (Photo)
- Scranton lore says that when Biden was living in the house as a kid, he scrawled on his bedroom wall: "Joe was here." The Kearns family painted over his childhood graffiti. That's why Biden signing walls became a thing.
Biden paid tribute to Kearns in a statement released by the White House: "Over the many years I knew Anne Kearns, and the many times I visited her at my childhood home, I knew her as an embodiment of Scranton values."
- "She was a woman of integrity, grit, decency, compassion, and grace," the president continued. "Her greatest joy and her greatest pride in life was her family — her large Irish Catholic family — that always welcomed me home."
- "North Washington, Maloney Field, Green Ridge Little League, Fisk Street, Simmey's, Marywood University, St. Paul's Church, and so much more. Nothing but joy and friendship. Anne was Scranton. And Scranton will miss her. Jill and I share our deepest condolences with the Kearns family and all those who loved her."
