Cara Leanne McManis

   FamilySearch ID: L5V6-NLB. Find a Grave ID: 75698755.

  General Notes:

Cara was adopted by Charles McManis when he married Eva. Birth Certificate at Warren County, IL was changed to McManis. Graduate West Bend (Wisc.) High School (1971). Attended Viterbo College and University of Wisconsin Madison 1971-1974. Steelworker, US Steel, 1976-77. Country Western singer during this period (Cara's Last Chance Band). Graduate Merrillville Beauty School, 1981. Manager Hair Performers Beauty Salons 1981-85. Management consultant, John Amico Co.,(Chicago) 1985-1991. Manager, Marshall Field's State Street Salon (Chicago) 1991-2001. Director, Gary Art Works 2001-2. Student and independent businesswoman 2001- until she graduated with a Master's Degree in 2005. She accepted a position at the Legacy Foundation in February of 2007 and worked there as Vice-President until her death in August of 2011 of kidney cancer. Both her obituary and further history are at her Find A Grave Memorial# 75698755.

Cara majored in theater and music at both Viterbo College and the University of Wisconsin. A woman of varied interests and talents. After a bit of prompting she accepted the marriage proposal of her husband on October 4th, overlooking Picnic Point on the University of Wisconsin campus. Married at the age of 21 she shortly thereafter started her own country western music band. That was coupled with a year and a half as a millwright apprentice at the coke plant of US Steel. Perfecting a facial scrub at that time to get out the coke plant dirt, she entered it in a 'Beat the Beauty Experts' contest at Family Circle magazine and won a free weekend in New York for herself and her husband. Soon after she entered beauty college, became a salon manager, then a consultant and then managed one of the largest salons in the country at Marshall Field's on State Street in Chicago. Following that she reentered school and graduated from Indiana University in 2003 and received a Masters Degree in Public Affairs in 2005. She is a volunteer at the Field Museum in Chicago as well as receiving a summer internship from that same institution in 2004.The results of that summer study were published by the Field Museum.

Cara married Stephen Edward Spicer, son of Rev. William James Spicer and Ruth Harriet Mott, 14 Dec 1974 in Madison, Dane County, WI. (Stephen Edward Spicer was born 8 Aug 1945 in Appleton, Outagamie Co., Wisconsin and was christened 9 Sep 1945 in Appleton, Outagamie Co., Wisconsin.)