The Autobiography of William L. Bagnard
Documenting Life in the Bagnard and Mohn Families since 1852
I am now 90 years old and with this autobiography I will attempt to give my family a picture of what life in the Bagnard family has been since my Great Grandfather Lambert and Grandmother Cilinie (Odinet) Bagnard left their (home near Sedan France) and came to the United States in 1852.
They settled in New York City where Lambert engaged in the manufacture of Willow Baby Carriages. In 1860, Lambert moved his family and business to St Louis Missouri and after the end of the Civil War they settled in Washington Iowa and later moved to Lone Tree Iowa and then to Muscatine Iowa. Great Grandmother Cilinie died in 1888. In 1882, my Grandfather Gustavus married Emma Beltzer of Columbus Ohio. When they lived in Muscatine my Grandfather Gustavus started a farm for himself and became very interested in the culture of a variety of fine fruits. He was the only one in a family of three boys and one girl who decided to leave Muscatine and come to California. Of course, he took his wife Emma and his oldest son Lionel Lambert Bagnard with him.
When my Grandparents arrived in California in 1888, my Grandfather obtained executive positions in the Terminal Railroad, the Pasadena Packing Company and the Pasadena Investment Company. However, his chief business was as superintendent of the Rubio Canyon Land and Water Association, which was incorporated in 1893. In that capacity, he established reservoirs connected to miles of water pipes from the mountains to provide water for Pasadena. He was also in charge of a ranch comprised of all of the land that is now Altadena on which he planted grapes, oranges, lemons and apricot trees, as well as barley.
He sent my father Lionel Lambert Bagnard to finish his education in Throop College (The fore runner of Cal Tech). After graduation in 1906, my father established the Bagnard Hardware Company, with locations at 152 & 785 E. Colorado Street in Pasadena. It became a large and prosperous enterprise and was one of the leading business concerns in Pasadena.
My Grandfather built a home for himself and my Grandmother Emma, on north Marengo Ave, which he shared with my Aunt Flossie and her nurse, Mrs. Gates. It was a corner house and next to it, he maintained a 150’X350’ orchard filled with a variety of trees. North of that orchard he reserved a very large lot for my father to build his own home. My Grandfather had always moved around Altadena and Pasadena by horse and buggy. But one day, he decided he should have one of the new-fangled automobiles that were beginning to become popular. So, he called up the Cadillac dealer in Pasadena and told him to deliver one to him. The salesmen brought one out, collected his check, told my Grandfather how to start the car but not necessarily how to stop it. It had a huge fly wheel on the side of it and he instructed my Grandfather to crank the fly wheel and then to get behind the wheel of the car to steer it. The salesman left and my Grandfather started the car. He then got behind the wheel and pulled the lever to make it go. It started down through the orchard. My Grandfather pulled on the steering wheel and yelled: “whoa, whoa, whoa!” My Grandmother followed behind yelling: “Stop it Gus, stop it” But it kept going until it banged up against a tree at the far end of the orchard and its engine shut down. My Grandfather got out and said he would never use that car again and it sat in that spot for twenty years or more. I used to play on it and pretend I was an expert driver. Many years later, after my Grandfather had passed on, some boys offered to buy it from my Aunt Flossie and she sold it to them for fifty cents. They took it away without paying her and she never got the fifty cents.
Flossie Bagnard, my father’s sister lived with her parents and her nurse, Mrs. Gates, who took care of her because she was perennially sick. Flossie was noted for her paintings and was endowed with the Bagnard mechanical skills, so she drove the car that my Grandparents provided to make their way around Pasadena. After my Grandparents passed away, Flossie, moved to another home and decided to rent out a portion of her new home to a man by the name of Alvin Laughlin, who worked as a checkout clerk at a grocery store. Alvin, eventually asked Flossie to marry him and she accepted his offer with the provision that he would inherit none of her money when she passed away! He readily agreed but what Flossie didn’t know was that Alvin was worth millions from his oil wells in Texas and had taken the job in the grocery store to help the war effort because we had a shortage of men with so many of them in the armed forces.
I was in a fox hole in Germany when my mother sent me a letter to tell me about Flossie’s marriage. She said to Flossie, who was still a virgin when she got married: “What did you think of the sex?” Flossie replied: “Well, I could bear it but I certainly don’t like it” I laughed so hard that the members of my combat team gathered around to see what the joke was.
Another Bagnard was my father’s brother Bert. Bert was a classic, full of love. He would do anything for you and like my father he was an ardent Mason, extremely conservative and violently critical of FDR. Bert followed in my father’s footsteps and became the Grand Master of the Corona Masonic Lodge in Pasadena. When I was enrolled in USC, my brother Lyle, thought that I should join the Masons and for several weeks Uncle Bert coached me to learn the ritual necessary to become a member of the Lodge. He was able to quote the rituals that each of the officers provide during the initiation. Bert, was also noted because he drove Ansell Adams, through the California National Forest.
After my father had passed away and whenever I had a problem, I could take it to Uncle Bert, and he did everything in his power to find a solution for me.
Roy Bagnard, one of my father’s brothers, was the real genuine athlete in the family. He was so strong and so well coordinated, he could win in any track event he entered. In High school, he ran the 100 yards, the 220, the high jump and the pole vault. He threw the discus and the shot-put. His fellow students offered him ice cream cones for any event he won – and he won them all! In some events he consumed twelve or fourteen ice cream cones! He did compete on the U.S. Olympic team but I’m not sure which events he won. He had a friend called Kid Marcey, who was a professional boxer. Roy had never boxed and he was reluctant when Marcey asked him to get in the ring to box with him. Marcey told Roy he would be easy on him and would not try to hurt him. So Roy reluctantly got in the ring and Marcy danced around and kept hitting him. After they had been in the ring for several minutes and Roy was taking a hurtful beating, he got mad. So he threw one right hand fist in Marcey’s face and knocked him out with one blow. It took them ten minutes to wake up Marcey.
On another occasion, after Roy was much older and hadn’t competed in several years, he came up to our home on Marengo Ave. My brother Gus was in high school and was competing in the discus throw. He was practicing in our front yard and by rotating his body in true discus fashion he had been able to throw the discus from our driveway across the front lawn to the bottom of the six foot fence at the upper end of our property. Roy said to Gus: “I will give you a spot to shoot for”. Roy took the discus and without turning his body he heaved it right over the top of the fence and it landed several yards up the hill.
When I graduated from high school, my brother Lyle had become the personal manager for the California Ship Building Corporation in San Pedro and had hired both Roy and me to work the swing shift. One night I got a phone call from Lyle who was in a San Pedro bar. He asked me to find Roy, and bring him to this bar because Lyle said: “The honor of the Bagnard’s was at stake!”
It seems that Lyle got into an arm wrestling match with a huge, muscular, three hundred pound, Slovenian fisherman who beat Lyle. So I found Roy, drove him to the bar and Lyle asked the big man to compete with Roy. Both men sat at a table and faced one another. Everyone in the bar lined up to watch the match. Roy sat there and held the big man’s right hand while the big man was straining to put him down. The muscles stood out on the big man’s arm and the big man could make no progress. After about two minutes, Roy looked up at Lyle and said: “Okay, Lyle, should I do it now?” Lyle said: “Okay Roy, do it now!” Roy put the big man’s fist down in two seconds and banged that fist on the table several times! Of course, Lyle was ecstatic and said: “The honor of the Bagnard’s has been saved!”
He was given the responsibility for hiring 80 thousand Okies, Arkies and Texans to manufacture the Victory ships for WWII. So he persuaded me to take a job in the ship yard rather than join the Army at that time. My mother had moved down to Redondo Beach to help Louise take care of my Grandmother who was suffering from Alzheimer’s. I moved in with them so I would not have so far to drive back and forth to the shipyards. In those days, everything was rationed and it was impossible to even buy a new tire for my automobile. But I discovered that, since I was in an essential job, I was entitled to buy a brand new car! So I went to a Chevrolet dealer I knew in Newport Beach, who had a warehouse full of brand new cars that he couldn’t sell. I purchased from him a brand new Chevrolet, equipped with all the things that a young boy would want on an automobile, including a short wave radio, flicker discs and spot lights. And, of course, four brand new tires! That entire well-equipped car cost me a grand total of $1,350.00.
One day I was in Lyle’s car with him and we were driving rapidly down the road toward the ship yards when a cop stopped us and was about to give Lyle a ticket. Lyle said: “Well, hurry up and give it to me. I’ve got to get down to the ship yard because I have a lot of people to hire”. So the cop said: “Oh, I have a son that needs a job, if you give him a job I might forget about the ticket”. Lyle said: “Forget that! I don’t play that way! Go ahead and give me the ticket”. So the cop said: “Well, if you feel that way about it, I’m not going to give you the ticket” So Lyle said: “If that’s the way you feel, send your son down and I’ll give him the job!”
I was born on January 22, 1923 in my parents’ home at 2621 North Marengo Ave, Altadena, CA. It was built by my father, Lionel Lambert Bagnard before he married my mother who was then Bessie Lenore Mohn. They were married in that home and both of my two older brothers, Lionel Lambert Bagnard Jr, (Lyle) and Gustavus M. Bagnard (Gus) were also born in that home. In those days most of the people didn’t go to a hospital to have a baby and they didn’t have a way to determine the sex of a baby until it arrived. When I was born, there hadn’t been a girl in the Bagnard family for almost 50 years. The last girl baby had been my paternal Aunt Flossie Beatrice Bagnard, who was almost 50 when I came along. Since my parents already had two boys, they very much wanted to have a girl and they had talked themselves into thinking I would be one. They were so convinced that they named me Josephine Elisabeth before I arrived and that name was the only one I had until they asked my Grandfather Bagnard to name me. Since he had a French heritage, he gave me both English and a French name which was, and is, William Lucien Bagnard. After I got old enough to think for myself, I didn’t much like my middle name so I shortened it to William L. My oldest brother, Lyle, was 14 years old when I was born and my older brother, Gus was 7.
Lyle was his own worst enemy! He was very handsome and his friends called him The Beau Brummel of California. He didn’t like school and was always pulling some kind of stunt to get out of class, like crawling on his stomach behind the teachers back to get out of the door before she caught him. His teachers really couldn’t handle him and when I got old enough to go to school the teachers would say: “Oh you are Lyle Bagnard’s brother! We hope you will be a better student than he was!” He had a chip on his shoulder and almost daily got into a fight and would come home with all of the buttons on his shirt ripped off. My mother soon got tired of sewing them back on so she told him he would have to sew them on himself. As a result, he turned into a very capable seamstress!
When Lyle was sixteen, my father gave him a brand new Model T Ford. It only took him one day to wreck it. So, my father told him, he would not replace it. Lyle flew into a rage and talked, one of his friends (Harold Tabor) into leaving home with him. They went up to Monterey and got a job in a theatre. When Lyle left home he put a note on the door of his room that said: “Because of lack of a car and parental understanding, I am leaving home!” He then locked the door of his room and climbed down the rock chimney from his second story room and left. This happened when he was a senior in high school. In Monterey, he became the manager of the theatre and after six months he came home to watch his high school class graduate. He never earned a high school diploma, but some of the things he accomplished later in life proved that he was both smart and capable.
Gus was very different than Lyle. He was a good student and when he was in elementary school he decided to learn to play a violin. If you have ever heard a lot of God awful noise, all you have to do is listen to someone who is learning the violin! On one occasion, he was scheduled to play in a school concert. The whole family was getting dressed to attend the concert, and so I got some scissors when no one was looking and cut off my long hair. When my mother found me doing it she said: “Billy, why did you do that to your beautiful hair?” And I said: “Mom you don’t tell true!” And she said: “What did I say that wasn’t true?” So I said: “You told me I could have my hair cut when I was three and now I am five and it is still long and I don’t want everyone at Gus’s school to see me with long hair”! So she finished the job for me and I was happy.
Gus went to high school at Muir Tech and he wanted to play on their football team. But he was not a very large kid and the coach told him, he was too small to play on the varsity team. But Gus persisted until coach said: “Ok, let me weigh you and see if you are large enough”. So Gus got some ten pound window weights and hung them around his neck under his sweater. The coach discovered them but said: “If you want to play that much, I’ll give you a shot at it.” Gus played as first string center on the varsity team for two years and he was able to do a superior job when facing much larger opponents.
We lived across the street from the Zane Gray family. His home took up a whole city block, and that property contained the family home, another home for their full time gardener, another building that served as a photographic studio and another home that housed the Japanese family that kept house and cooked for him. They had a big tennis court right across the street from our home. Zane Gray’s oldest son Romer, and my brother Lyle became best friends. The next son Loren and my brother Gus were also good friends. A daughter, Betty, was married to our good friend Bob Carney. We called Zane “ZG or Doc” because he had originally been a dentist. Then he came to California and started to write books like “Riders of the Purple Sage” and he made a fortune! He owned monster yachts, loved to fish and took my two older brothers with him on fishing trips all over the world. They went to Nova Scotia, Tahiti, Suva, New Zealand, and Australia. I was too young to go with them except on one occasion we went up to Oregon and fished for Steal Head on ZG’s camp on the Umpqua River. Like my father, Doc was a died in the wool Fly Fisherman. On this trip, my mother, my brother Lyle and I went along. ZG had a particular rod that Lyle wanted, so he challenged ZG to a fishing contest for the rod. ZG looked around to see what kind of flies were feeding in the water and then he sat down and tied a fly to match them. Then he went out in the river and began casting, Lyle took a long stick tied a leader and a fly on one end of it and asked my mother to come with him to the falls. My mother took a large bowl and Lyle would throw his fly in to the roaring falls. He pulled fish after fish out which my mother collected in the big bowl. After an hour went by, my mother and Lyle, came back with twenty fish. ZG got a total of four! So Lyle got ZG’s prize rod and my mother cooked the delicious fish for us over an open fire.
Lyle and Zane Gray’s oldest son (Romer) decided they wanted to start an animated movie business (Ala Walt Disney) so Mrs. Gray gave them an enormous check for $50,000.00 to get them started. They took over three gigantic rooms in the Zane Gray home and hired a group of illustrators. When Halloween came they decided to throw an enormous party to advertise their new venture. The illustrators decorated the three rooms and a huge number of people were invited to the party. Everyone wore costumes and Mrs. Gray, who was a rather large woman, dressed as Mae West. ZG, who always had an eye for good looking ladies, asked her to dance not realizing that he was dancing with his own wife. That was only one of the embarrassing moments during the course of the party. Much booze was consumed and several guests got into trouble when they wondered around the huge Zane Gray estate. ZG, became very indignant when he found that one couple had decided to make love in the back seat of his cherished Lincoln automobile. A lot of fun was had by almost everyone but unfortunately the party did not ensure the success of the company. So finally they had to disband the company and Mrs. Gray’s $50,000.00 was gone.
Later on, ZG took both Lyle and Gus on a fishing trip to the International Angling Contest in Sydney Australia. Because ZG had suffered a sun stroke which left him slightly paralyzed, he was unable to personally take part in the Angling contest. But he entered both Lyle and Gus in the contest and between the two of them they took all of the prizes! Lyle came out the big winner because he caught the largest fish ever caught on a rod and reel! He hooked a huge Tiger Shark and brought it in after a tough four hour fight. The Captain of their boat towed the monster fish back to the pier in Sydney Harbor. When the crane hauled the fish out of the water by the tail, a full sized Airedale dog dropped out of its mouth! Evidently the fish swam close to the shore and swallowed the dog that was playing in the water close to the beach. When they weighed Lyle’s huge fish it totaled 1,382 lbs! Some of the producers of the contest offered Lyle $1,000. for the fish so they could show it to the public. Although $1,000. would have meant a whole lot to Lyle at that particular period of time, he refused to sell it. He said: “If I take money for it, I will lose my armature status”. So he gave it to them! The severely bent rod he used to catch the fish went to the Smithsonian Institute in Washington DC and was displayed there for the many years that Lyles catch was still a world record.
After I went into WWII combat forces, and Lyle had hired his 80,000 Okies, Arkies and Texans to run Cal Ship, he decided he wanted to leave the ship building industry and help our combat forces. So he enlisted in the Navy and received an Officers Commission to command a PT-Boat in Guadalcanal. He was attached to a Seabee Unit whose was job was to unload all of the ships that arrived to keep our combat troops supplied with food, ammunition and everything they needed to fight the Japanese. Lyle didn’t have to get into actual combat because when our supply ships arrived the Japanese didn’t want to fight a PT Boat. One day the Seabees were unloading a supply ship and the crane was hoisting a frozen cow which fell into the water. The officer in charge said: “Oh, we can’t use that one. It went into the water”. So Lyle’s crew fished the cow out of the water and used it to supplement their food supply. After that incident they managed to dump one cow into the water whenever they were unloading a recently arrived ship.
Lyle, was greatly disappointed that he had been unable to get into actual combat, so one day he talked to one of the combat troops and told him that he would really like to get up to the front where he would be in a position to eliminate some Japs. The combat officer agreed and took him up to a place where he could be of great help to the combat troops.
On another trip ZG took Gus to Australia and they hired a large number of Aussies to make a full length motion picture called “White Death”. While they were in Australia making that picture, Gus met a wealthy Australian girl named Patricia Tebbutt who really attracted him. Her mother and father lived three hundred miles in the “Outback” in a town called Boggabri. Patty’s father owned a large mail order house that did business all over Australia.
After Gus came home he got a job as a draftsman for Douglas Aircraft. Patty was really smitten with Gus, so she talked one of her school mates “Peggy Murray” to travel with her to the U.S. They visited us in Altadena, bought a car, and took off for a tour of the U.S. In Albuquerque, Peggy was driving and they got into an accident which killed her. Patty got a broken pelvis. She came to Altadena, stayed with us and when she was well she returned to Australia. After she got home, Gus proposed to her by International Wire and she accepted. In the meantime, Gus left his job at Douglas Aircraft and accepted a position as a test engineer for the Chicksan Company in Brea. He did such a good job that later he became the Chief Engineer for the Chicksan Company. Many college trained engineers worked under him. That was an exceptional credit for him because he didn’t have a college degree. He later took another trip to Australia and married Patty. While they were there my Father passed away and ZG wrote a wonderful letter, about my farther, to my Mother which she cherished.
Gus and Patty raised four sons. The eldest, David Bagnard, is still very much alive and lives near Boise Idaho. The other three John, Peter and Steven and have all passed away as has Patty.
One day when I was very young we were at a large party and I was dancing with my mother and she pointed out a rather fat and short man and said to me: “You know Billy, that man is Bunny Patton, who owns the Patton Blin Lumber Company, and he almost became your father”. I said: “How could that possibly be?” and she said: “Well, when we were in high school, I was very much in love with him but he was only 5.1” tall and I kept growing until I got to my present height of 5.11 ½!” I decided that we didn’t look well together. Then I met your father who was 6’ tall and we fell in love! When he asked me to marry him I said: “Yes Lyle, I would like to marry you if you will promise me that, so long as we are married, you will never consume alcohol of any type!” She imposed that condition because her father had been an alcoholic which shaped her distaste for anyone who drinks. My father was so much in love with her that he made her that promise and stayed true to it for his entire lifetime.
My father and mother were very social and members of the leading organizations available at that time. My father was, first and foremost, an active member of the Masonic lodge. He attained the 32nd Masonic degree in the Scottish Rite and then became the Grand Master of the Corona lodge in Pasadena. Subsequently, he became the Grand Master of all the California lodges with headquarters in San Francisco. My mother was active as a Rebecca and in the Eastern Star. They were both devoted Bridge players and their good friends Herman and Maud Taber, came to our home every week to play Bridge. The two women loved to talk and so they were required to do all their talking in another room while the two men played Cribbage. After the ladies got all their talk out of the way, the four of them could play Bridge, without a lot of interruptions from the ladies.
On one occasion they went to a friend’s home for a very large Bridge party with several Bridge tables in the living room. The hostess of the party, looked up and was horrified to see her, young four year old daughter, walking into the room, stark naked, and dragging a very wet nightgown behind her. Before the mother could say or do anything, the little girl walked up to one of the tables and said to the two men: “You, or either, you, left the seat up and I fell in!”
My father was very bright, devoted to his business and to his family. He was an expert carpenter having built his own home and he loved to hunt and was an expert fly fisherman. I emphasize the fly when he fished because he felt that fishing with a fly was the only way that a true fisherman could do the job properly. We and several of our Pasadena friends had cabins on the edge of Silver Lake in the High Sierras. This little colony of ours was called “Little Pasadena”.
Wallace Berry, the famous movie actor, had his vacation home on an island at one end of Silver Lake and he and his guests arrived on a sea plane that had pontoons. My father taught me how to fly fish and when I hooked one of those monstrous fish you could hear my screams all over the lake!
The mountains rose high above our cabins and, one year, a great snow slide came down and pushed all of the cabins out to the center of the frozen lake. Then, when spring came, and the ice melted, all the cabins went to the bottom of the lake! Shortly afterwards, the great 1929 depression came and no one had enough money to rebuild. The depression forced many changes on the Bagnard family. In his business, my father had a very large inventory of materials that the building contractors needed and he allowed them to purchase on credit. When the depression hit they were unable to pay him so he had to absorb all their costs of doing business. This forced him to go out of business and look for other ways to stay afloat. He was very conservative and very much against FDR’s efforts to put everyone on the Government Payroll. He was able to obtain a job as a forest supervisor in the Angeles National Forest. In that capacity he was in charge of all the CCC camps established by FDR to provide work for young men. On one occasion he took me with him to one of the CCC camps high up in the mountains and then he took me for a four mile hike down into a canyon where we could catch some fish. At one point on the trail, we came across a very large rattlesnake who was about to strike a bird. My father held out his boot and the snake tried to strike it and instead my father put his foot down and pinned the snake down right behind his head. Then my father put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a small pearl handled knife and cut the snakes head off. The snake continued to move around without his head and we left him there on the trail and continued down the canyon where we caught several fish. An hour later, we returned and that headless snake was still moving around on the ground! My father continued in that job until I was thirteen years old. Then one night he went to bed and never woke up. From that point on my mother did everything she needed to do to keep all her family going. When you think about it, it was a herculean task for her to take over a homestead that included her three boys, and a lot of their friends. I was thirteen when my father passed away.
My Mother, Bessie L Bagnard, (Bess) was the most outstanding person I’ve ever known. Everybody loved her. She was very talented and she spent her whole life doing things for other people. She was a great cook and the door of our home was always open for any of our friends who wanted to join us for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Sunday breakfast always drew a herd of people who couldn’t resist her wonderful home cooked waffles and pancakes topped with her delicious lemon butter. Not to mention the ham, bacon and eggs. Our home never had a locked door and all of our friends knew they could invite themselves and they would be welcomed. The only thing she did just for herself was to attend the Rose Parade each New Years Day. She rode in the very first Rose Parade and she loved it. All the following years of the Rose Parade she went just to see it. When we had the hardware stores on Colorado Blvd. she would take tall stepladders out on the sidewalk in front of the store and we would sit on them high above the crowds of people and watch the Parade. She lived for 86 years and the last Parade in her lifetime was the only one she missed! The Tournament of Roses Committee honored her for her record!
But going back to a much earlier period, my very best friend was a boy who lived a block and a half away and belonged to a family that was outrageously wealthy. Ogden Kellogg lived in a home that had everything anyone could possibly want. Their home had three stories and the top story was occupied by several servants who took care of the family. The Kellogg home included a tennis court, stables, a separate home for their gardeners and an orange orchard that occupied many acres of space. The family welcomed me as though I was a part of their family. The servants took very good care of the family but they were given the freedom to have fun among themselves. For instance, I was invited to a breakfast on April Fool’s Day and when the breakfast was served it consisted of pancakes ham and eggs. But, when we tried to cut into the pancakes we found that the cook had placed a round piece of cardboard in the center of each pancake and it was impossible to cut.
The first floor of their home consisted of a very large kitchen, a butler’s pantry, a very large dining room, front room and library. When you entered the front door, two huge stairways swept gracefully on either side of the entry hall, to the first landing where, backed by a stained glass window, and was the largest organ that anyone could imagine. Then further up on the second floor was the master bedroom for Ogden’s parents, William, and Alice Kellogg. A double bedroom which was occupied by Ogden and his slightly older brother William. Another bedroom where his younger sister Jean resided plus another bedroom occupied by Katie Banner, who was the wonderful nurse who raised all of the Kellogg kids. Ogden and I managed to do all the things that young kids usually were involved in, such as taking straws out to the orange orchard, and lighting them up pretending we were smoking cigarettes! We also discovered the fun you could have with a couple of paper cups with a string in between them, where you could put them to your ear and talk to one another. We thought that was so much fun that we attempted to take the string from his home to mine, which was a block and a half away. We couldn’t understand why we couldn’t talk to one another from that great distance.
On the other side of the tennis court and the stables was the home of Ogden’s Grandparents. They too, lived the kind of life that was only possible with people of great wealth. Ogden’s Grandmother (Nana) was a direct decedent of the Scripts Howard newspaper chain. They maintained separate homes for their chauffeur, and the servants that served them. Mrs. Kellogg was involved in many worthy charities which included the Scripts home for the aged in Altadena. They also had properties that involved a large portion of La Jolla. On one occasion, when they included me on a trip to La Jolla, we sat down to have dinner but Ogden’s father was very late in arriving. When he finally arrived he sat down and said: “Please excuse me for not being here when you started dinner, but I have been involved in a very large business transaction. I have just bought the La Jolla Tennis and Beach Club!” His normal occupation involved his ownership of the Glendale News Press.
On one occasion Ogden’s father took his older son Bill back to New Jersey to witness the landing of the gigantic German dirigible, called the Von Hindenburg. They were on the site and took pictures of the huge dirigible when it caught fire and exploded when attempting to land for the first time on American soil.
On another occasion, Ogden received a horse that he wanted to train as a rodeo pony. In a rodeo, as you know, they turn loose a calf and the cowboy has to chase after the calf on a horse, rope it and then get off the horse, run up to the calf and hog tie it. Ogden was fascinated with rodeos and thought he would train his new horse to go through that exercise. But since we lacked a calf to rope, he thought it would be great if he roped me in place of the calf! He did that and then got off of his horse and rushed over like he was going to tie me up, but the horse turned around and started to trot away and since I had the rope around my waist, I had to run after him, That spooked him and he broke into a full run and finally I fell down and he was pulling me on my back for about a block of pavement that ended up in a dirt road that went down to their gardener’s home. I was really spooked because I knew that before we got there, we would have to go through a garden of roses with all their thorns! But luckily, before we got to the rose garden, the horse ran into a low hanging branch of a tree which stopped him. I was really scraped up from being dragged a long distance on my back. They took me home because I had major burns on my back that were going to take a long time to heal. That meant that I had to miss the opening of the basketball team at school, which was a real trauma for me.
Later, Ogden got an infection in the mastoid behind his ear and was faced with a very long recuperation period. So his family decided that they would all take him on a long trip to Japan. When he finally came home, he brought me a number of presents that they had purchased in Japan. But when he was gone on this long trip, I developed another close friend (Jimmy Ketcham).
Jimmy was very mechanically inclined and put together a soap box derby racer that made it all the way to the Soap Box Finals in Columbus Ohio. I was fascinated and wanted one of my own. Then he got the idea of extending the length of his soap box racer and on the back end of it he put a one cylinder gasoline engine that had previously powered a Maytag washing machine. I couldn’t wait until I could find a similar engine and was able to duplicate a self-powered cart for myself. With those two carts we were able to travel all over Altadena. A great many times we used the carts to travel all the way to the top of Marengo Ave where one of our class mates (Edith Kayser) lived. The Kayser’s lived on a very large property that contained three different homes, as well as a barn where they kept Dixie their horse and a pasture where they kept Molly their cow. Molly wasn’t an ordinary cow! She had a very bad temper and if you entered her pasture, she would chase you like a mad bull. We knew better than to enter her pasture! Kingo, the Japanese man who worked for the Kayser family, was able to rope her horns and tie them to the fence so he could milk her. She seemed to trust him but no one else could get the job done.
Mr. and Mrs. Kayser, had a separated marriage so each lived in a different home. But each of the children managed to get the proper amount of (Mother/Father) attention from them. Edith’s older sister Ann took a trip to Germany and fell in love and married a Nazi in Hitler’s regime. She eventually saw the error of her life and came home to live as a loyal American.
Kingo, who cooked and took care of the family, was very temperamental. Sometimes, when he was out of sorts, he would bang the plates on the table when he was serving us a meal. Mrs. Kayser solved that problem by using unbreakable pewter plates. Every once in a while Kingo would walk off and disappear for two weeks at a time. They always welcomed him back because he was a much needed servant. Later, during World War II, they discovered that he was a high ranking Japanese Secret Service Agent and was using those two weeks trips to train Japanese American people to be subversives in America.
All of us had a lot of fun riding Dixie the horse up in the mountainous back country that was close to the Kayser compound. The problem was that when we tried to put her saddle on her she would blow up her stomach so that later when she let the air out, the saddle would become loose and we would fall off! We soon learned to kick her stomach when she attempted to blow it up so we could be sure the saddle would stay tightly on her.
Mrs. Kayser knew that I didn’t have enough spare money to attend Miss.Golotze’s dancing class, so she paid my way to go with Edith. Miss. Golotze, was delighted to have me in her classes because there were always a lot more girls than there were boys. Eventually she arranged to have me join her classes free of charge.
The Kayser home became a meeting place for a number of our friends who attended Altadena Elementary School. Our gang consisted of Jimmy Ketcham, Paul Goldman, a Jewish kid who loved to pick a fight with strangers and then stand behind me and yell: “Hit them Bagnard, hit them!” Then there was Jane Scales, a foxy little girl who was only five feet tall, but full of sexy curves, in all the right places. I dated her for a while but we really looked funny when we danced! Then there was Stuart Favor, a crippled boy in a wheelchair who suffered from Infantile Paralyses. He was very bright and was a lot of fun to be around. Then we had Leslie Hood, whose father owned Vromen’s Book Store in Pasadena. Leslie’s father gave me a job of driving Vromen’s trucks to make deliveries to their customers. He paid me $.50 an hour which doesn’t seem like much but it was okay because I could go to lunch and get a hamburger and a chocolate malted milk shake for a total of $.35.
Often Mrs. Kayser, transported a number of us down to La Jolla where we could spend several delightful days on the beach at Emerald Bay. After completing 6 grades in Altadena elementary school we graduated to Elliot Jr. High School, where we completed the 7th through 10th grades. Then we moved on to Pasadena City College to finish high school by completing the 11th and 12th grades. Those schools gave us a good education except for one embarrassing fact. We were able to read and understand thoroughly what we were reading but we were not taught how to sound out words so we could spell them properly. All of us have gone through life with a serious spelling deficiency.
When I graduated from High School, my brother Lyle talked me into going to work in the ship yards rather than enter college at that point in my life. When I became a ship builder I rapidly attained a supervisory position for which they paid me $1.82 per hour, with time and a half for over time and double time when I was needed on Sundays. I was often asked to work both over and double time so I rapidly accumulated sizable savings. My mother said to me: “Billy, these are very strange times and I want you to know that you may not ever make more money than this in your entire life!”
So far, I’ve told you a lot about the Bagnard side of our family, and since I’ve indicated that I went to live with the Mohn side of our family in Redondo Beach this would be a good place to acquaint you with my Mother’s side of our family.
My Grandmother was a member of the Box family in Michigan. Her brother, Uncle Hosea Box was a wealthy farmer who lived in the Lancing area and who had established a large number of his family in the Michigan farming industry. He regularly came out to stay with us in CA to get away from the cold Michigan winters. Somehow, my Grandmother, Josephine Box, met John Mohn, married him and they came to CA to raise a family. In many respects, it was a hard life for her because John became an alcoholic. Despite that, they managed to raise a family of Mohn’s who became very exceptional people. My grandmother loved to sew and cook and she produced patch-work quilts by the dozens and made the best lemon meringue pie in the country! Her oldest daughter, May, became a teacher, saved her money, built the home in Redondo and invested in a prime piece of property in Palos Verdes. She passed away from cancer shortly after I was born but she included me in her will.
My mother, Bess, came next and was one of the greatest, loving people in the world. Her primary passion in life was to take care of anyone who needed her. She raised Louise, the youngest of the kids. She loved to raise flowers, travel and take long hikes in the rugged mountains. When she was in her seventies, she and Louise went on 10 to 15 mile hikes in the rugged mountains surrounding Lake Tahoe. One of her particular delights was when she could find some maiden hair fern to bring home to plant in her garden. These were hikes that would tax the stamina of a 19 year old athlete! Two months before they left each year to go up to spend a month in the beautiful cabin they rented on Fallen Leaf Lake, Bessie would get in top physical shape by daily walking the longer route to the market that made her go up and down several steep Redondo hills.
One of my mother’s brothers was Elmer Mohn. He went into the construction business and had a notable career. He built several tunnels that lead into the Pasadena freeway he also built the Los Angeles county court house and a building to be occupied by the Barker Bros Company in down town Los Angeles. During the construction of that building he was climbing from one floor to the next in the elevator shaft and one of the rungs on the ladder he was climbing broke and he fell down the elevator shaft from the second floor to the second basement. His body was broken in many places and they took him to the hospital and were preparing to cut off one of his legs. He became aware of their intent and said to the doctor: “If you cut off my leg, I’ll come back and kill you!” They didn’t know what else to do, so they placed his legs in a cardboard trough lined with cotton, and left him for the night. During the night he woke and was very uncomfortable and in attempting to shift his position he fell on the floor on the broken leg. He finally managed to get well and with his broken body he was still able to continue to build several more important buildings.
One of my mother’s other brothers, was Clarence Mohn. He found his way to New York, married a Swedish lady and went to work in the Merchant Marine. He was the only one of the Mohn’s who I didn’t like because when I was a child, he used to torment me! He was always on my avoid at any cost list!
One of the most important people in my life was Aunt Louise Mohn. Louise was never married but she was like another mother to me. They say she never got married because she couldn’t find a man as smart as she was. She was very close to our family because my mother really raised her. She had several special teacher friends from Fremont High School. They had a teacher group called the Fair, Fat and Forty Club. Of course it evolved into the Fair, Fat and Fifty and then the Fair, Fat and Sixty, and on and on. For the purpose of this autobiography I think you can get a better feel for her by reading my eulogy at her funeral, which is enclosed herewith:
I’m sure that everyone here who knew Louise and countless others scattered all over the world that couldn’t be here today, will miss her deeply because she left an indelible mark on all whose lives she touched. I know that I will miss her because she was like a second mother to me – and I know that Jackie and Billy feel the same way. Hardly a day ever went bye that Jackie wasn’t on the phone with Louise for long conversations. In fact, I think I would have been money ahead if I’d installed a private line between Redondo and Brentwood.
Louise was truly a unique individual – cast out of a different mold than most people we know. She was very bright, interested in everything that went on around her, and until the last few months, full of energy and always on the go.
To say that she was bright is putting it mildly! Her high school academic record earned her a four year scholarship to Mills Collage, and while there, she participated in a nationwide competitive exam, along with 4000 other students, and was one of only six who won a one year, all expenses paid, scholarship to the Sorbonne in Paris.
She was full of love and she spent a lifetime giving of herself and doing things for others. Although she had no formal church affiliation, she lived her entire life in accordance with Christ’s teachings. I’m sure there’s a special place in heaven for her.
Because she gave so much of herself, Louise had a multitude of friends all over the world. She taught school for over 40 years and, although she has been retired for 20 years, scores of her former students have kept in contact with her. A lady whose name was in her address book, and received my note, called yesterday to express her grief and sympathy. She was in tears and indicated she was one of Louise’s students and had loved her very much. When I asked this lady when she had been at Fremont High, she told me she was in Louise’s first class in 1924! Since that call, I have heard from several others who studied under her and have kept in touch over the years.
Dr. Rodney indicated that, after Louise retired in 1964, she was honored as the “Woman of the Year” by the “Muses of the California Museum Foundation”. Since telling him that, I found a publication from the Muses and was reminded that Louise was the first person to be so honored! Among those to be named in succeeding years were Edith Head - Fashion designer, Jail Patrick Velde – Television producer and Ray Eames – Designer. It is a tribute that a high school teacher should head a list of such distinguished people but it was an honor that was certainly deserved in Louise’s case.
She loved to travel. She went to Canada annually for several years to check on the progress of the Dionne Quintuplets. And after she had covered all 50 of our states, as well as Canada and Mexico, she started on the rest of the world. She did South America in depth, Europe several times as well as Scandinavia and the British Isles. She went to Russia as a member of the first American group allowed to witness a Sputnik launching. She went to Cape Canaveral for several of our space launches. When she was in her 80’s and couldn’t find a friend to go with her to China, she went by herself! And she was planning a second trip there. She went to Oberammergau for the Passion Play in 1980 and wanted to go again this year for the special Passion Play performance in honor of its 100th year. I found a letter she had started to one of her friends in England in which she said:” that she probably wouldn’t make it because she hadn’t found anyone to go with her and Bill and Jackie, bless them, would have a fit if I went alone.” Her last trip was to New Zealand and Australia last year after she had the cancer operation. And, on all of those trips, she collected another group of friends to love and with whom she stayed in contact.
Dr. Rodney indicated she loved sports – and I think that stemmed from all of the years that she supported the athletic teams at Fremont High. She was knowledgeable in all the finer points of football and basketball. She watched all the USC and UCLA games that were televised and listened to the play by play on the radio when games were blacked out. She did the same for the Lakers, and the Rams, and, more recently, the Raiders. Not only did she know every player on the Laker team, but she was familiar with almost all of them in the entire NBA. When Jackie, Billy and I were traveling in Europe for a month during the football season and couldn’t get news of the scores, she would call us once a week with all of the scores and a play by play description of the game’s highlights.
She took me to the Olympics when they were here in 1932 and she had tickets for several of the events in the Olympics here this year. When we were discussing all of the traffic and parking problems expected around the Coliseum, I kidded her and said: “She would have to ride on the back of my motorcycle when we went to the Opening Ceremonies” And she replied: “That is perfectly alright with me. I will get there anyway I can!”
She loved the out of doors and all of nature. One of her greatest joys was taking slide pictures and then bringing them home to show her friends. And, she was an exceptional photographer! I have never been able to do as well!
She loved to fish and, when she was in her70’s, she broke a leg, jumping from one slippery rock to another, in a rushing mountain stream. But, that didn’t stop her. She continued to fish (and jump rocks) for many years after that accident.
She taught me how to pull a limit of trout out of a madly rushing mountain stream when no other fisherman was catching a thing. The secret involved using a leader the thickness of a human hair. And, when my large, clumsy fingers proved incapable of tying that almost invisible leader to a tiny hook, she tied them for me, by the dozens, and presented them to me in special cases whenever I went fishing for mountain trout. I don’t know what I will do when my present supply runs out!
Louise was truly a remarkable person, with a great zest for life and love of people, and she has left this world a better place because of her life here.
I could ramble on for an hour without scratching the surface of my memories of her. So, perhaps, I should stop and read you a portion of a letter that just came from my nephew, David Bagnard, who lives in Boise, Idaho. In a very few words, he just about said it all --- “Louise was loving, caring and outstanding in everything she did.”
My Grandmother was suffering from Alzheimer’s so my Mother had moved to her home in Redondo Beach to help Aunt Louise take care of her. I moved in with them so I would have a closer drive to Cal-Ship in San Pedro. But the problem was that, in those days, everything was rationed and I was unable to buy new tires for the ones on my car which were rapidly going bald. Then, I found out that, because I was working in an essential industry, I could purchase a brand new automobile which, of course, would have four new tires on it. I had a friend in Newport Beach who owned a Chevrolet Agency that was filled with new cars he could not sell. I picked out the sportiest model I could find and equipped it with chrome flicker disk hub caps, spot lights and a short wave radio. The whole thing, including tax, license and delivery, cost me a total of $1,350.00.
My Mother’s Aunt Katherine, (my Great Aunt Katherine) was one of the most talented, interesting, capable, dedicated and loving of all our relatives. Somewhere in the Middle West when she was Katherine Mohn, she married a man by the name of Duncan. We don’t know what happened to that marriage but evidently Katherine didn’t like it because it lasted less than a week. Aunt Katherine walked out and came to California, Mr. Duncan filed for divorce which was accepted because there was no one to contest it. We don’t know what happened to Mr. Duncan because we never heard from him. The funny thing is that Aunt Katherine brought his name to California with her. She was always known as Katherine Duncan. Aunt Katherine’s special talent was the ability to design and produce high end dresses for very wealthy clients. One of these was Mrs. Patton, the mother of General George S. Patton, the World War II hero and incidentally my commanding General of the
Third Army. I met and talked with him three times during the war, but I never had the nerve to tell him that my Great Aunt had held him on her lap when he was a baby. Aunt Katherine made dresses for California Governor Marcum’s wife and the Marcum’s took her on a great buggy drive into Yosemite. They were the first people to spend the whole summer in that beautiful valley.
Aunt Katherine was ambidextrous and she used patterns to put dresses together. There was always a right and left pattern that had to match exactly. She was able to put a pencil in each hand and on a piece of paper, simultaneously draw a right and left pattern that matched exactly!
Aunt Katherine built three gigantic homes during her career in Altadena and Pasadena. Those homes held her and the several seamstresses who produced the dresses she designed. Helen Wingarth, was her bookkeeper and her special friend. She always built a separate house for Helen. The second house she built was produced for her by the famous home contractors, Green and Green. When she furnished that house, she went back to New York and had Tiffany build a special lamp for her. It was made in 1900 and she paid them one thousand dollars for it. In those days, that was a lot of money! That lamp is now 113 years old and it is in our living room! Get Billy (your dad) to tell you the story of how we got it.
When I was four years old, Aunt Katherine treated my mother and me to a boat trip through the Panama Canal and up to New York. In New York, Aunt Katherine bought a new Nash automobile and we drove the horrible dirt roads all the way back to California. We averaged three flat tires a day. Those two wonderful ladies and a four year old making it all the way back to California was an amazing accomplishment.
Aside from manufacturing high end dresses Aunt Katherine’s greatest love was travel and cooking delicious meals. We always looked forward to going to her home for our Thanksgiving dinner. She made everything from scratch and it was wonderful. Then, after finishing a fantastic meal, we would retire to her living room and she would sit in a big leather chair underneath her Tiffany lamp and enchant us with stories of her travels around the world.
In order to have a vacation home that we could all enjoy, she built a house right on the beach, half way between Ventura and Carpentaria. Since that house was only for vacations it was empty most of the time and she wanted to protect it from the many tramps who rode the railway between Los Angeles and San Francisco. So she built the home with a secret closet that held all of her valuable furnishings so they wouldn’t be found by any of the tramps who might break into her house. On one occasion, a violent ocean storm came so far ashore that it was about to destroy the house. When the water washed underneath the house it broke in two and the neighbors were able to find the secret closet that held all her precious belongings. Luckily they managed to save them for her before the entire house was washed out to sea. She rebuilt the house but this time located it behind the huge muscle rock that would protect it from any future storms. She kept that house for a great many years because the oil companies knew that there vast oil reserves underneath her property and wanted to buy her out.
When our country was subject to liquor prohibition we could sit in her living room and look up the beach and see the bootleggers bringing whisky ashore in small boats. It was very exciting for someone as young as I was to watch them. On one occasion when we were with her enjoying her beach house she went to the kitchen to cook our dinner and she decided to cook an apple pie for our dessert. But somehow the containers in her kitchen got mixed up and instead of making the apple pie with sugar she used salt, you can imagine our reaction when we tasted that beautiful pie.
When the great depression came Aunt Katherine became land poor. The very wealthy (what was left of them) no longer could afford her expensive dresses and she had to look for other ways to make money, so she put together large luncheon parties in Cactus Crest, her huge home on the banks of the Pasadena Arroyo Seco. She set tables for 100 to 150 guests and provided a wonderful luncheon. That kept the wolf away from her door.
When I was overseas fighting WWII in the trenches, Aunt Katherine would send me her very special homemade oatmeal cookies (which she called Rocks) contained in large tin cake containers which could be sealed tight to preserve the cookies for the month or more that it took to get them to me. When I received them I shared them with my comrades and all of them were full of gratitude for dear old Aunt Katherine.
When I joined Cal-Ship, of course I had to join the union. My first job was on a rigging team which moved the big two ton steel plates around to various locations in the fabrication bay. In the top of the bay we had a crane operator and by using hand symbols we could move all kinds of parts for the Liberty ships where ever they needed to go. One day I visited Jimmy Ketcham and in trying out his new motorcycle I broke my leg but that didn’t stop me from working in the ship yards because they put a walking cast on me and I was able to continue with my job. I soon became the lead man for the crew in the shop and I directed the crane operator who ran the crane from above and took my instructions to guide the steel plates exactly where I wanted them placed. While working as a rigger, I went to school and learned how to lay out the plates we were working on. One of the jobs of a lay out man was to place a big wooden form on a plate then draw a line around the form then take it off and on that line with a hammer and punch pound dimples into the line all the way around the plate so that a person with a cutting machine could cut the plate to the exact dimensions needed. This was a long and laborious process and I soon had the idea of building a flat sided punch that we could use to put the punch marks around the wood form in a much faster fashion. This speeded up the process of fabricating a plate and got the full attention of the supervisors I worked for. Often when one of the ships was completed and ready to slide down the ways and into the water they would invite a lady dignitary to crack a bottle of Champaign against the side of the ship and name it. Then at the bow of the ship there was a six inch long steel plate that held it from going down the ways. Often I was invited to take a cutting torch and cut that plate to send the ship on its way into the harbor. We had many adventures in the shipyard. We played tricks like sneaking up behind a person who was standing on top of one of the steel plates and without him knowing it welded his boot to the plate. Then of course, when he tried to move off the plate, he fell on his face. Then I had unfortunate experiences. When somebody I had worked with, and trusted, asked me to loan him $1,000.00 dollars. When he took off without paying me, I lost not only my $1,000.00 dollars but a friend!
While I was working at the ship yard I got the opportunity to take a week off and so I traveled up to Northern California, where Jimmy Ketcham, had become an instructor for Navy pilots. He took me up in a Stearman Training Plane that was designed for acrobatics and tried to make me yell uncle while he was ringing the plane out with every acrobatic known to man. He couldn’t make me sick. I loved every minute of it and we had a lot of fun together. One day he took me out to a practice area and to teach me to land the plane exactly in the middle of a huge bulls-eye on the ground. He came towards the target very high. Then he began slipping the plane from side to side to get closer to the ground so he could very smoothly put the wheels right on top of the bulls-eye. Then it was my turn. I approached very high and then by slipping the plane to get closer to the ground in a hurry I got close to the bulls-eye but I was two feet high. But I was determined to land that plane right on the bull-eye so I stalled it and we dropped the last two feet right on target. It was anything but a smooth landing but I had succeeded in attaining my objective!
Later on, we were practicing dropping a small bomb on the target and in one attempt the bomb did not release, so Jimmy indicated that was a dangerous situation and we would have to fly back to his headquarters. In getting there he took the plane right over the top of a farm where a pretty young girl was milking a cow in an area outside of the barn. As we went over the top of her, the bomb released and dropped down hitting the cow right in the back and he was killed instantly! You are supposed to ask, what happened to the girl? And my answer is: “She was left holding the bag!”
When the time finally came that I was called up by the draft board to enter the Army, I very much wanted to join the Air force for training as a pilot. My good friend Bob Carney, who was the husband of Zane Gray’s daughter Betty, was a Colonel stationed in Santa Ana as an Aerial Photographer. He told me not to worry, because Hap Arnold, the Commanding General of the entire Air Force, was a good friend of his and he would have me back with him and teach me how to be an aerial photographer in the Air Force. When I went through the draft boards process, I came to a table that contained members of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air force. I tried to select the Air force but that person passed me over to the Army and the Officer said: “Congratulations, you are now in the Army and are going to Camp Custer Michigan for basic training”. At Camp Custer there was snow on the ground. Everyone except me was moaning and groaning because I knew that in a week’s time I would be on my way back to California to join the Air Force. Strange as it may seem that never happened. So after my basic training I was transferred to a military police escort guard unit at Fort Leonard Wood in Little Rock Arkansas. I was given the job of picking up German Africa Corps Prisoners at various east coast ports and escorting them via train to various prisoner stockades throughout the U.S. I didn’t particularly like that job and so I took competitive exams to transfer to the Army Air Core and was sent to Shepard Field Texas where two weeks of highly competitive exams won me an appointment as an Air Corps Aviation Cadet for pilot training. Those exams were so competitive that only four of us out of every barracks of 200 men were selected.
On 9/25/43 I was transferred to an Air Corp College Training Detachment at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. The physical training there was intense and for the first two weeks I was so sore from the physical exercise that I could barely climb the steps to my second story room in the barracks. In our spare time we had a lot of fun and dated the sorority girls on the campus. We were instructed not to go to down town Des Moines alone because there was a detachment of 5,000.00 WAC’s (Women Air Corp) who might attack us. So, we went in groups. On 1/10/44, our Commanding Officer informed us that no more pilots were needed and that all of the 30,000 cadets in the country were to be drummed out of the Air Corp and transferred to Army Infantry units to be trained as infantry men in anticipation of the coming invasion of Europe and Japan. I was transferred to Camp San Luis Obispo in California for that training. We spent each day on the beach, learning to handle 10 man rubber invasion life rafts so I was sure I would be sent to the South Pacific. Instead on 5/17/44, I embarked from New York, on a captured Italian troop ship and was transferred to England.
On 6-5-1944 – D Day - I was transported by a British ship to make the landing in Normandy, with the 29th Infantry Division of the First U.S. Army. It was fortunate that I made the crossing from England on a British ship because it was their custom to give rum rations. That rum served to dull any feelings of fear I might have had. The commander of the landing craft that I was on failed to get us close enough to the shore and when the ramp went down for us to debark, many of the soldiers who had 70 pound packs on their backs, jumped off and sunk to the bottom and drowned. I was lucky enough to be 6’4” and with the training that I had received in San Luis Obispo I was able to keep my head above water. By the time we reached the shore, I could find no one I knew. So I approached another soldier and the two of us fought on our own. We were able to shove some bangalore-torpedoes under the barbed wire that guarded a bunker which contained a cannon that had been shooting at us when we landed. We were able to reach the bottom of the bunker and throw grenades through a port to kill the Germans who were manning the cannon. We were also able to kill several Germans in dug outs that surrounded the bunker. Then we made our way up to the hedge rows and fought on our own with no one to direct us for several days. When General Patton launched his 3rd Army, I was transferred to his command in “I Company, 3rd Battalion, 2nd Infantry Regiment, 5th Division” and fought with that unit until VE Day on 5-7-1945. During those 11 months of combat I was promoted through all the enlisted grades from Private to Master Sargent. In the last few months of that war, I served as an acting platoon leader which normally calls for the rank of 2nd Lieutenant. I was offered a battle field commission but turned it down when I was informed that, if I accepted it, I would have to serve an extra year in the European Occupation Army after the war ended.
When we crossed the Mosel River, one of my Sergeants was killed. We continued to fight and capture village after village on our way down to the place that Patton wanted to make the crossing of the Rhine River. In one village we entered after dark and the Germans that occupied it had already left. So I entered one of the village homes and when I stepped through the door the family was gathered around a table at the other end of the room. The father looked up at me and, thinking I was German, he rose to his feet extended his arm and said: “Hail Hitler”. Then he looked a little closer and noticed that I was not German so he said: “Nix Hail, Nix Hail, Hitler Nix Gut!”
Then we kept fighting from village to village until we got to the point where Patton wanted us to cross the Rhine River. At that point a member of the Graves Registration Team came to me and said they had not been able to find the body of the Sargent that I reported was killed so they would like me to take a jeep and a driver back and find him. I made my way back to the point where the Sargent had been killed a week before. We found him, put him on the Jeep and headed back down the road towards the place where we were going to make the crossing. The road was loaded with Jeeps, Tanks, Navy boats and all the equipment needed to get across the Rhine River. By the time we got back to that spot, my unit had already crossed the river and had erected a bridge of Baily-boats to get the equipment across. We had to wait in line to get across because the Germans were trying to knock out the Baily-Boats with both artillery and occasional planes. So my driver and I got down in a ditch to keep our heads down and wait for our turn to cross. About that time another Jeep arrived and General Patton, wearing his pearl handled revolvers, got out and looked down at us and said: “Hey you sons of bitches come up here. I want to talk to you”. So we scrambled up out of the ditch, saluted the General and he was very happy. He said: “Well, you sons of bitches have done it! Now, we’ve got our backs to the Rhine and nothing will stop us until we get to Berlin”. About that time another Jeep with a war photographer arrived and the man said: “General Patton, I wonder if I can get your picture with your back to the Rhine River?” General Patton said: “Son, I’ll do better than that, I’ll take out my old penis and pee in the Rhine! You can take a picture of that!” We were there and got to watch that newsworthy act.
On another occasion, when we were fighting the Battle of the Bulge, Patton said to us: “You sons of bitches are not here to die for your country! You’re here to make sure that those other sons of bitches die for theirs!”
When we were fighting the Battle of the Bulge, we found ourselves on top of a mountain, opposed by some very determined Germans who were convinced that their very existence depended on maintaining control of that mountain. I lost one of my very best friends in that fight and it was particularly hard on me. Christmas time was approaching and the powers that be in the United States had advertised that every American GI in combat in Europe would be treated to a good old fashioned Christmas dinner, with turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, covered with hot gravy, a gelatin salad and apple pie for dessert. So our kitchen crew pulled up in an area at the bottom of that mountain and cooked our Christmas dinner. Unfortunately we were spending every night carrying our wounded comrades down the hill on stretchers to be transported back to a base hospital for treatment. That gave us no time to eat the Christmas dinner. Finally three days after Christmas we were able to hike three miles back to an area where our kitchen crew could feed us a very cold and worn out Christmas dinner. I took my dinner tray through the line and received a cold portion of that three day old dinner. I took my tray back to a large log that had a one story high canvas looming behind it. Before I could attempt to eat I noticed that peeking out of the canvas was a very white finger with a gold ring on it. When I pulled back the canvas to see what was under it, it turned out to be a pile of dead German bodies! So I took my cold Christmas dinner over to a garbage can emptied it and made my way back to combat. After we had eliminated all of the Germans who had occupied the top of that mountain we were free to move on to other adventures.
During our fight for the City of Metz, we had to stop just outside of the city because all of Patton’s armored tanks, trucks; artillery etc. had run out of gas. When we were finally supplied with the fuel necessary to progress further, we moved into the city and stayed in some of the many homes that were available to us. But towering in the mountains surrounding the city of Metz, were some of the heaviest fortifications in all of Europe. It had been weeks since we were able to take a bath and get cleaned up. Looking out of the window of the home that my squad occupied, I saw, out in no man’s land, a tin bath tub. So several of us braved the machine gun fire from the Germans in the mountains above! We hauled the tin tub back to the little home that we occupied. We made a fire in the kitchen stove and heated water to fill the tub. We had just reached the point where we were about to take a much needed bath when we were informed by our company headquarters that they had set up a series of showers outside of the city and we could get in trucks and go out to the tents that had been erected on top of the snowy ground to take a shower. Because of my size, the clean clothes I had in my barracks bag had been custom made and went with me to the shower. After each of my comrades had a shower they were offered new uniforms to wear. I, of course, used my own uniform and when we got back to our quarters in the city we found that all of my comrade’s clothes contained fleas. I was the only one that escaped that horrible experience.
On another occasion, when we were in Metz, some of my men reported to me that there was a safe in one of the German banks that looked very interesting. So I got a bazooka and we blew the door off the safe. It was filled with millions of German marks which we, of course, thought were worthless, so we handed them out to everyone we knew, and sent some home in the mail. Later I found out that the American government was willing to value them at 10 cents per mark. That was an opportunity that went astray because it could have made me rich if I had put them away to be converted to good old American cash!
On another occasion in Metz, I found a German motorcycle and fixed it into running condition. I was so delighted that I threw caution to the winds and took the motorcycle for a ride out in the country, but when I came under fire from the machine guns above, I hastily made my way back to town and retired that motorcycle.
On another occasion we went into one of the homes in Metz, and discovered that its former occupants had been collecting unused sheets of every German stamp that was produced during the Hitler regime. I presented all of those stamps to a friend who was a stamp collector and later learned that I had given him what would be worth a fortune when we returned to the United States.
When we were fighting in the Battle of the Bulge, we were required to advance to the top of a large hill and capture the Germans, who were dug in a forest. One of the solders under my command was a young man who was so timid that he was afraid of his own shadow. His name was Qual Quentin Quay who had been a shoe salesman in civilian life. Qual was normally not much use to us but there was not much we could do to get rid of him. As we were climbing up the hill, one of our artillery spotters who were flying overhead in a Taylor Cub looked down and mistakenly decided that we were German troops. So he directed our American artillery to open fire on our position. The results were horrendous! We were being killed by our own artillery! Everyone turned around and ran back down the hill. Qual Quentin Quay arrived at the bottom of the hill carrying his arm which had been shot off! He found one of our medics and screamed at him: “Sew this back on me, or I will never again be able to sell shoes!” I pointed my Carbine at the rest of my men and ordered them to go back up the hill. We finally conquered the Germans hidden in the forest above us.
On another occasion, our mission was to secure a bridge which offered the only way for the German troops to escape to the other side of the river. We were usually supported by the 5th Divisions 4th Armored Troops but in this case they were not available to us so we took up positions in the top of a building past which a German tank had to travel to get across the bridge. We had two Bazookas and when the German tank was right below us we fired into its cockpit killing its Commander and then we shot the other Germans who tried to escape.
During the end of the war, the German troops surrendered to us by the thousands. They mistakenly thought that we were going to team up with them and fight the Russians. On the last day of the war, we were traveling along a road in Eastern Austria, and knew that ahead of us we were about to encounter the last of the elite, Hitler Panzer Divisions. Suddenly, our progress stopped. We saw our division, battalion and company jeeps all traveling along the road, toward the Germans and, after a long agonizing wait, our Commanders came back and informed us that the Germans had given up and the war was over! To say the least, that was a happy day! We then made our way back from Eastern Austria and my company took over a little town in Western Austria called Pocking.
Pocking, contained a German Luftwaffe facility where they had left all of their ME109’s setting on the tarmac and full of gas. That was very unusual because normally the Germans destroyed any aircraft they were forced to leave behind. Since I had learned to fly small aircraft, I decided that I would get into one of those powerful German pursuit planes and taxi down the runway. Maybe, I would have the nerve to lift it slightly in the air and then set it down again before I reached the end of the runway. That was a great deal of fun and I had a ball. The next day members of our Air Force came in to take command of this German Luftwaffe base and found out what I had been doing. They let me know, in no uncertain terms, that I couldn’t do that again. So I told them that I was in charge of all the automobiles that have been left in Pocking and that if they wanted some of the automobiles in my possession to take little trips around Europe they were going to have to offer me the opportunity of riding with them in one of their pursuit planes. They were happy to take me up and try to ring me out with all the acrobatics they needed to make me give up. That was a thrilling adventure for me and in return I turned over some super automobiles for them to make their way around the country.
When the time came for us to return home we went to a huge facility called Camp Lucky Strike, and waited for a ship to return us to the United States. During what seemed like a long stay at Lucky Strike, I had the opportunity to make several trips into Paris, where I could have fun. At that point in my life I didn’t smoke cigarettes but had stored a number of cartons which I could take into Paris and sell for $20.00 per carton.
When the time came for us to board the ship, to take us home, one of the solders under my command had won $4,000. by gambling when we were at camp Lucky Strike. He came to me and asked me if I would hold that $4,000. for him until we reached home. He said: “If I run out of money and ask you for some more during the trip home, please don’t give it to me, because I think I have made enough to buy a nice home for myself after we return”. Several days later, when we were on our way home, he came to me and begged for another $100. because he had run out of money and felt sure he could make some more. I refused to give it to him but he begged and begged until I finally relented and gave him the $100. A couple of days later he came back to me and said: “Here’s another $3.000. to hold for me”, which I did and I was thrilled because I knew what all that money was going to mean to him when he returned to civilian life.
When we got back to the United States, I was sent back to my home in Los Angeles, for a 30 day recuperation period after which they wanted me to go to the South Pacific and take part in the final invasion of Japan. I was lying on the beach with all my friends at Emerald Bay, and we were listening to the radio and got the news that President Truman had dropped the Atomic Bomb on the Japanese and they had capitulated and WWII was finally over. Up until that moment, I had no use for President Truman. But after he, in essence, saved my life by dropping the bomb, I felt that he was a hero.
When I completed my 30 day recuperation furlough in California, I drove my beautiful Chevrolet that my mother had stored for me while I was in Europe, back to Camp Campbell. I spent most of my time promoting my battlefield comrades so they would have a little more rank to brag about when they were discharged. When my own discharge occurred, I decided to drive up to Michigan to visit some of my relatives that I knew about but had never met. Of course I was very familiar with Uncle Hosea Box. When I arrived, he made sure that the other members of his family would greet me with open arms. On one occasion, I sat down to dinner at a table that contained forty of my relatives who I had never met. One of Uncle Hosea’s sons, Harry Box, had two young daughters who were approximately my age and they took me out into their Maple Forest to show me how maple syrup was produced. Then they suggested we sit down on a big log. Both of those young girls were very attractive and, while we were on the log, they both took turns in teaching me how to become a kissing cousin! I found that life as a farmer can be a lot of fun!
When it was time for me to leave Michigan and return to my home in California I advertised in the local Michigan paper for anyone who wanted a free ride to California to accompany me. I found two young men who were happy for the opportunity to go to California and they offered to help me pay for the gas that it took to get us there. It was winter and we made our way through a number of snow storms on the way home. When we got to a location which was half way between Albuquerque and Gallup New Mexico, an automobile which was coming from the other direction started to slide in the snow and was heading directly toward me. I had the choice of meeting him head on or taking my car over a ten foot deep bank to avoid him! Of course my car was totally wrecked and the three of us had to proceed to Los Angeles via a bus. When I arrived in California I contacted my insurance agent to be reimbursed for the damage done to my automobile. He told me that since my two passengers were sharing the gasoline expenses with me that I was using my car for hire and they could not compensate me. To say the least this made me very angry, and so I gathered up all my medals and decorations from the war and made a call on the insurance company’s District Manager. After seeing how I had conducted myself in combat, he decided that they would pay for the damages. Of course there were no new automobiles available at that time, so I purchased a big blue used Studebaker and used it during the four years I spent as a student at USC.
When I entered USC on the GI bill, one of my first class mates was Mike Banta, a nearby neighbor, in Altadena. Mike and his family were ardent Catholics and so he took me to the USC Newman Club, a building designed for Catholics to gather. I became well acquainted with several of them (boys and girls). One of them was a transfer from another school who had been a Lambda Chi Alpha at his previous school. Lambda Chi was one of the largest and most successful fraternities in the country but didn’t have a chapter at USC. He proposed that several of us should attempt to establish a Lambda Chi Club at USC rather than join one of the other already established fraternities. That sounded like a worthy adventure to me and so I became a member of that first group. We rapidly brought a number of other friends into the group and had a lot of fun in the process. We met, not only at the Newman Club, but every day we got together around a large memorial rock on the lawn of the USC Library on University Ave. Soon we decided that we needed to have a fraternity house of our own, where we could accommodate some live ins, have meetings, have meals and take advantage of all the activities that the other fraternity’s enjoy. We rented an old mansion on 30th street, hired a cook and several of us moved in. One day when I walked into the dining room where a number of our friends were having breakfast, Johnny Watson piped up and said: “Here comes the Rock of Lambda Chi Alpha”. And I became known as “The Rock”. I became very active in extracurricular activities on the USC campus. I became a Trojan Knight, a member of the Executive Committee on the Inter-Fraternity Council, a member of the Greater University Committee on which I accepted the project of redesigning the USC Graduation Diploma. I wrote to about 15 of the largest universities in the country, got samples of their diploma’s and designed a new one for USC. It was a great improvement over the old one and the USC Administration adopted it. I think it is still in use today. I also became very interested in USC politics and fought the liberal non-org candidates, such as, Jessie Unruh. We attracted a number of Lambda Chi Alpha alumni who lived in the Los Angeles area and several of them helped us to achieve our goals. When the National Fraternity promoted us from a club to a full-fledged chapter, I became its first High Alpha (President).
One day I became aware of a beautiful old mansion on Adams Blvd that was formerly built for Fatty Arbuckle an old time movie star. It was for sale for $29,000.00 and I found we could buy and remodel it for $10,000.00 and then pay off the balance with a mortgage. But in those days, who had $10,000.00? So I put together a brochure to appeal for money from parents and Lambda Chi Alumni and went to work to raise that amount. My theme was twenty years progress in two but, as you can imagine, that was not popular at the UCLA house, because it took them twenty years to get their home, and we were about to do it in two! To make the story short, we did raise the $10,000.00 and got not only the house but an enormous lot for parking.
I received a great education at USC but still had a lot of time to have fun. One little episode was so much fun, I have to tell you about it. One weekend we went up to CAL for the football game. In those days the CAL rooting section was completely out of hand. We sat in our seats across the stadium from them. Having left, George Tire-Biter our mascot, at home we erected a very large USC banner behind our seats. CAL had one of their students dressed up as “Oskey the Bear” running all around the stadium. During the first half some of the CAL students came over and stole our banner without our being aware of it. And, in the second half, they displayed our banner in their rooting section and taunted us. I decided there was a way we could get even. So, after the game was over, we stayed in the stadium until everyone had gone home and then, we went down to the store room where CAL kept all of their cards for card stunts and the “Oskey the Bear” uniform. I had noted where the store room was and that there was no lock on the door so four of us went into the store room, found the “Oskey the Bear” uniform, put it in a sack and put it in our car. We took it home to Los Angeles and when the CAL students found out their mascot had been stolen by some Lambda Chi’s, all hell broke loose. The problem finally got to the Head Administrative Officers at both universities and our Executive Vice President finally came to us and told us we would have to arrange an exchange of our banner for their “Oskey” uniform.
CAL was coming down for the game with UCLA so I arranged we would meet the CAL students at high noon in front of Tommy Trojan on our University Ave and make the exchange. Then I went down to the National Guard Unit in West Los Angeles and talked its Commanding Officer into loaning me a Sherman Tank and driver. We dressed one of our Lambda Chi brothers in the “Oskey” uniform and he and I and two other brothers got on top of the tank and steamed up University Ave to Tommy Trojan. We arrived with the tanks canon pointing right at the CAL students. That exchange of “Oskey” for our banner was a classic and was covered by the Los Angeles newspapers. We had the last laugh!
In those four years at USC I think that those of us that were battle weary GI vets of WWII were more capable of handling college fun than were the younger civilian students with whom we joined.
I first met Jackie when we had an exchange with her sorority at UCLA. We went over to UCLA, entered her sorority house and sat in their large living room. Then she and her sorority sisters came down the steps from the second floor. When I saw her my eyes lit up. I went over to her and said: “Would you be my date for tonight”? She said: “Oh, I would love to but it is has already been arranged that I will be the blind date of, Johnny Watson, one your fraternity brothers”. She and Johnny decided to go steady and I became better acquainted with her at several other parties. Then on another occasion all of us went north to San Francisco for a football game, and we rented the Presidential Suite in the Mark Hopkins Hotel. We had a gigantic party in that suite and I started a conversation with Jackie, but the room was so crowded, I asked her if she would like to sit under the grand piano with me to finish our conversation. I told her that when we graduated I had no plans for marriage because I was going to be very busy in business and she told me that she had no plans for marriage because she was going to have a great business career in her father’s company. Neither of us knew it but we both managed to fall in love during that conversation underneath the piano! Later on we got together and decided that it was inevitable that we get married. After we were married I managed to convert her from a UCLA graduate to a full-fledged Trojan and UCLA lost her for all time.
Both of us have been very active in promoting USC over the years. I am a life member of the USC Cardinal and Gold, and a member of its Board of Directors. I’m also a life member of the USC Presidential Associates, and an active member in the USC Scholarship Committee. I am a life member of the USC Alumni Association, and a member of the USC Scull and Dagger, the top USC University Honor Society. We have made donations that have been divided between the USC School of Business, the USC Department of Medicine and the USC Athletic Department. Through USC we have provided funds to take care of each of our Grand children’s educational expenses. All of us are proud to be members of the USC family.
Upon my graduation from USC, I found that because I had a reserve commission in the US Army it was going to be very difficult to obtain meaningful employment, because of the new war in Vietnam. So I had to resign my reserve commission in order to be considered for a meaningful civilian job. I finally was hired by the Republic Supply Company of California, and was sent to their supply store in Taft California where I called on the local oil drilling companies to sell them supplies for their oil drilling operations. Since I lived in Republic Supply Taft Store, I spent my time in the evenings, making calls to people who were interested in stock market investments. I had obtained a part time securities license from a Los Angeles investment firm, and when my income from investment sales began to exceed my income from the oil business, I decided to leave Republic Supply and concentrate on the sale of Mutual Funds.
I had been spending a lot of time traveling to Los Angeles on the weekends to see Jackie. When we decided to get married, we found a beautiful apartment in South Pasadena on Raymond Hill Road. Jackie’s only requirement was that our new home would have a fire place. So we moved in, got well acquainted with the other neighbors in our four family apartment building. We spent our very happy first year of marriage there. One evening we had gone to bed and an intruder climbed up our back stairway into our kitchen and bumped into our dining room table which woke us up. We jumped out of bed went into the living room and found a black man standing in the middle of the room. Jackie peered at him from behind my back and shouted: “You dirty man, what are you doing in my living room?” I went over to him, picked him up and threw him down the first landing in the front stairs and then we called the police. They arrived with their sirens blaring and found the man trying to get into the next apartment house. They arrested him and then came back and reported to us that he was an inmate from the local insane asylum. Our first year of marriage was not only fun but interesting to say the least.
I had become a broker with the New York Stock Exchange Firm of Harris Upham & Company. When Lud Grady, their resident partner passed away, I was selected to take his place. I was lucky enough to be offered two outstanding careers. One was to stay with Harris Upham, and become one of their ten partners. The other was to accept an offer from the American Funds Group to become their Executive Vice President. I finally decided to accept the offer from American Funds because I felt it was a sleepy little company where I wouldn’t have nearly as much pressure as I would have had from Harris Upham. It turned out that I jumped from the oil right into the fire at American Funds. Eventually I was promoted to President and finally to Chairman of the Board. I was also a member of the Capital Group Board of Directors, a Senior Vice President of Capital Research and Management Company, one of the founders of American Funds Service Company and a member of its Board of Directors. I also was the first Director of the Capital Group’s Emergency Recovery Agency and, of course, the Senior Director of the American Funds Wholesaler Sales Group. I gladly accepted calls from the hundreds of investment brokers who sold our Mutual Funds whenever they had a problem that I could solve. Those calls took a great deal of my time but it was money in the bank when our investment dealers knew that the top man was there to help them.
I also served on the NASD Arbitration Board to settle disputes between securities brokers and their clients. Above all else, in the securities business, I had the opportunity to interface with the brightest and most intelligent group of investment professionals in existence. My investment career was not only lucrative but it satisfied my desire to be of help to people who needed it.
I always felt that my son Bill would make an outstanding contribution to our American Funds operation but I didn’t want him to be subject to nepotism from the other employees. So I suggested to him that he go to work for a brokerage firm to get experience in the business. He started out by working for a couple of smaller brokerage firms and finally wound up with Merrill Lynch where he did an outstanding job. The day that I retired, he applied to American Funds and was accepted to be a wholesaler. As I expected he did an outstanding job and because of his great ability as a public speaker he became a top executive and the top speaker for the Capital Group. Those with the ability to keep a large audience spellbound can go right to the top as a much respected executive.
Billy is no longer employed by American Funds. He got an irresistible offer to work for Lincoln Financial Services. One of their most profitable products is a variable annuity which utilizes the American Funds Mutual Funds. Bill is their sales manager and has recruited a group of outstanding wholesalers, who are responsible for an enormous sales volume for the company. Bill is able to live at home but he travels all over the country to speak at meetings that his salesmen put together. He does a superior job for his company and still finds plenty of time to devote to his wife Tamara, and their four children. Of course, those four Grandchildren and our love of them is a major item in our lives.
Because this autobiography reflects primarily my and Jackie’s documents of life since 1852 we trust that our much loved Grand Children might like a short peek at some of their father’s life experiences which made him the man he is today.
First, his love of his mechanical toys. When he was a pre-teenager we bought him a go-cart much like the one I had when I was his age. In those days there was no home on the property next to 13168 Boca De Canon, where we lived, so we established a round track for his go cart and he had a lot of fun with it. Then, Chris Swanson, one of his class mates in Saint Mathews, got a small Honda motorcycle. Of course Billy wanted one too, so we bought one for him. The two kids wanted more space in which to ride their motorcycles so I decided that I should get in on the act and buy a motorcycle for myself so I could take them to places where they could fully use theirs. This, of course, promoted Billy’s great love of motorcycles.
On the lot next door we kept the motorcycle trailer that we used to get the two boys out to the desert. One day, Billy came to me, very excited, and said that somebody had stolen the trailer and had taken it down to the other branch of Boca De Canon. I immediately went into my bedroom and got my German Luger 38 cal. pistol. Billy got a baseball bat and both of us went down to where two men were about to get away with our trailer, I chased one of them up the hill with my Luger and the other one ran down to Mandeville Canyon Road with Billy chasing him with his baseball bat. After we got both of them back to the trailer, we called the Police and handed the two culprits over to them.
I had always taught Billy to be enthusiastic when someone called on the phone and to try to make them feel like he was very happy to hear from them. After I had joined Harris Upham, we invited my boss, Lud Grady and his wife Jean, to join us for dinner. Jackie and I were in the bedroom getting dressed and the Grady’s arrived early. Billy answered the door and said to our guests: “Hi Mr. and Mrs. Grady, my parents are getting dressed but if you would please come in, our bar is open, and you can pour your selves some booze!” They both loved that and never got over how well Billy handled the situation.
Billy went to Pre-school at our Methodist Church and was really quite advanced for his age. We decided that we would like him to go to school at Saint Mathews and when I approached the Head Mistress there she said: “He’s a year too young!” I replied: “If I take him down to UCLA and he passes their tests would you make an exception and accept him in Saint Mathew’s kindergarten class?” She agreed and I came back to her with his test scores and he became the youngest kid in his class.
We always encouraged Billy to take public speaking classes and, as a result, he developed the ability to stand before an audience and, with no notes, hold their very interested attention for an hour or more! This important ability has enabled him to become very successful and much in demand. Few people have his ability and so he is able to write his own ticket in the business world.
Billy has always given his Dad credit for being able to do more than a man my age should be able to do. So when he put together a group of his motorcycle friends to ride the Baja-One- Thousand he asked me to join them! I said: “Billy, I’m over seventy years old! I could not physically stand such a ride!” So he said: “Dad, La Paz is our last night on the way. Why don’t you fly down and join us there and then the next day ride the last 200 miles with us?” So, reluctantly, I agreed, flew into La Paz, checked into my room and then went to look for the group. I found Billy and he said: “Dad, let’s go back up to your room and I’ll bring the Baja Champion, who is guiding us on our trip, up to get you outfitted with the right clothes.” I said: “I don’t need anything. I brought my helmet, gloves and boots. Besides, I’m way too big for him to have anything to fit.” Billy said: “Don’t worry Dad. He has any size any one would need and you’ve got to have the full outfit to survive this ride coming up!” Much to my surprise, he did have my size in everything and they left me to put the whole outfit on. It took me a solid hour to figure everything out and get fully dressed. The next day, I was very thankful because I never could have made it without the proper clothes. That 200 miles was a killer! I had to do things I had never before done on a motorcycle! My ride wasn’t a thing of beauty and I had one bad fall but I made it and after the ride was finished, I was proud to get a medal that indicated I had: “Finished the Baja”
Always trust your Father! He may ask you to do things you think are impossible but he will find a way for you to get the job done!