Thankful for Life's Little Pleasures

Thanksgiving time and I am thinking about simple pleasures that make me thankful.  Then I get thinking about the people in my life who have passed on....and some of the simple things that brought them happiness and small pleasures.

Dad, Uncle Al, Uncle Bob immediately came to mind..

 Al  Rivet loved "Good & Plenty"

 Bob Wills loved eight track tapes

Art Mylott loved reading science fiction by Edgar Rice Burroughs

AND

And all three loved cigarettes, Camels or Lucky Strike,  until they all gave up smoking!

Doris Ann Laurent

Doris Ann Laurent of Troy married Robert William Wills of Cohoes on 25 April 1948. They honeymooned in New York City. The bride to be was given a shower by her future sister in law Dorothy Wills Mylott.

Left to right: Doris's mother Ann Dugan Laurent, ?, Doris Laurent,
Ann Wills Benoit, Dorothy Wills Mylott

Summer 1959: California here we come! Part 2

Summer 1959 and the story of Bob Wills, Art Mylott and Al Rivet continues.....The household furnishings were all sold off in the neighborhood auction.  The job resignations were handed in.  While the families on the east coast tried to sell the real estate and live without tables and chairs, Art, Al and Bob were driving west on Route 66  into L.A.   Judging from their letters, they made good time and drove straight through with only a few rest stops....

Al Rivet and Art Mylott

and Art wrote to folks back home as soon as he got to California....

Art Mylott in California, July 1959

and tried to communicate the experience of California freeways....

They soon saw the coast....

Left to right: Al, Art and Bob

 and started looking for housing and jobs....

Art Mylott on the right with real estate agent in southern California

Art and Bob checking out the real estate

Art Mylott in front of rental apartment

By the second week of July, they had temporary quarters in Fullerton. Though it was stressful, they also shared some good times described by Al in the letter below....

The wonders and amazements of California seem to have made big impressions on them all but as the weeks went by Bob and Art became more disillusioned and less hopeful about getting jobs at the levels they hoped.  In August, Bob and Art were back in New York.  Al remained in Fullerton  with a job and the start of a new life. 

Al Rivet on the California beaches he loved

The friendship among Art, Bob and Al would continue on...

1959: California here we come! Part 1

Auction, Auction - Catch some Good Buys and Lighten our Load!

We're moving to California!

Wills, Rivets and Mylotts heading out for a new life!

Out with the Old; In with the New!

1959: I was too young to really understand everything but I got the basic message: we selling out and moving to California- all of us - the Wills family of Wyantskill, the Mylott and Rivet family now of Green Island.  Our families all moved out of Cohoes after Wold War II and now, together, we were moving to the west coast to take advantage of the jobs, the sunshine, newer housing, and "fun in the sun".  Yes, everything would be better in LA because, well, isn't that close to Disneyland where your dreams come true?   So goodbye old man winter, no more shoveling that snow, no more Hudson Valley grey skies.  We were a few of many because at that time it seemed all Americans were moving west to California and we were not going to be left behind.

So we sent the men first in an exploratory mission and they drove off in a Buick? or was it a Pontiac? Then in April, the big auction in the backyard and everything we owned was taken away by neighbors who hung over the fences around our yard to bid on my uncle's bench saw, electrical supplies, carpentry tools, and a canvas tent I remember so well. Was it army surplus? left over from WW2?  Away went our living room furniture, my best girlfriend's mother bought our coffee table.  There wasn't much left but we wouldn't need much while the men drove west once again to find housing and jobs.  It would just be a matter of weeks or months. So we put the house on the market in Green Island. The Wills sold their house in Wyantskill. Mom and I moved in next door with Pipere Rivet in the little upstairs flat with an iron cast stove for cooking. Then we waited for news.....and waited to move....

The Wills Brothers: William Robert Wills i.e "Bobby"

Robert Wills was the youngest of all the Wills children and was only 12 when his mother died, 13 when his father died. His older sisters, especially Dorothy, took over caring for Bobby.  I frequently heard the story how, while living with Dorothy in 1938 (approximate year), he fell on the edge of the canal in Cohoes. He was riding a bike, delivering newspapers or as the other story goes, he was just having a good time. His head hit the stonework and opened a wide gash!  Initially, there was no money to pay for a doctor, so the wound was nursed at home. Soon he developed a fever and, in the age before antibiotics, it soon became infected.   Dr. Connally of Lansingburg practiced at Leonard Hospital and accepted Bobby as a patient even though he knew he wouldn't get paid right away and even though Bobby was close to dying from the infection - probably sepsis.  Dr. Connally saved Bobby's life.  In the years afterward, whenever we drove by Dr. Connally's house on 2nd Avenue in "the Burg", we made the sign of the cross and said a prayer for him because he was "so good to Bobby" and "saved his life".  In the 1970s, Dr. Connally was an old man but I saw him sometimes when I walked by his beautiful house. He would be walking in his yard with a cane.  I was fearful of approaching him and never spoke to him. Now I wish I had.  I wonder if he ever had any idea how much Dorothy and Bobby thought of him and held him in such high reverence! His services were completely paid for but it took a long time.

Sister and Brother: Dorothy Mae Wills & Wm. Robert Wills
perhaps at Saratoga Lake 

Bob Wills and wife, Doris Laurent
Newlyweds 

With his twins

There is so much to write about Bobby, Larry and the other Wills children!.  It will take time and several entries in this blog.  If you think you have a story to share about the Wills brothers and sisters, please forward and share.  Meanwhile, the stories will keep on....