Almont’s Jane Hoyt Wade – My Mom – Part 2

— PART 2 —

After moving to Herington, Kansas, Mom and Dad both got jobs. Daughter, Nancy Jane, was born in 1948. Shortly after Nancy’s birth, Grandpa Wade became ill and quickly passed away. Grandma Wade had problems handling Grandpa’s death. She had six children and Dad was the youngest. She expected Dad to stay single and take care of her until she died. Obviously, that couldn’t happen, so Grandma Wade acted out. When Mom and Dad would go to work, Grandma Wade would come over to the house and rearrange the furniture because it was “her house.” Every night Mom and Dad would have to put the furniture back to where they wanted it.

Grandma Hoyt was diagnosed with breast cancer and passed in July 1948. Later that year, Grandpa Hoyt became ill and Mom returned to Michigan to take care of him. Mom refused to return to Herington if they had to live next to Grandma Wade, so Dad moved to Michigan and went to work for his father-in-law. In 1949, I was born.

In August of 1950, Boots and Frank Bacholzky and Carol and the twins moved into Grandpa Hoyt’s tenant house. We had built in play pals until 1958 when Bacholzky’s moved into town.

In November 1950, Dad was recalled to active duty for the Korean War and sent to Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri. It was expected that he would be shipped to Korea, so the family moved to base housing in Missouri. Almont’s Dr. G. Clare Bishop interceded with the Army. He explained to the Army that Dad had two children, which was supposed to disqualify him from being recalled, he had a pregnant wife, and an ill father-in-law and that Dad should be discharged. He was discharged in December 1951.

The following month he went to work for Hamill Manufacturing Company in Washington, Michigan as their Purchasing Agent and son David Milton was born.

That spring he began construction on the family home in Grandpa Hoyt’s orchard. Except for the cement block and brick work and the plastering, Dad did everything else. The family moved into the house just before Christmas in 1956. The floors weren’t finished and there were a couple of interior walls that you could walk through but it was home. Temporarily the floors were covered with “butcher block paper” (thanks to Jack Terry).

With three children and a house to take care of, Mom settled into being a housewife. Mom was a member of the First Congregational Church and Dad joined. She did work at church and for the school.

Nancy graduated from Almont in 1966 and attended college at Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, Ohio.

In August 1968, as I was preparing to go to Albion College, Mom was admitted to University of Michigan Hospital with a persistent, uncontrollable cough. She was there for about a month. The doctors thought that she might have tuberculosis. It would take eight years before she was diagnosed with a very rare lung disease–bronchiectasis–only four known cases in the entire country. At that time there were no MRI or CAT scan machines and no endoscopes so it was not possible to determine her illness. Today, they would have discovered the problem and operated to remove the infected lung. Unfortunately, by the time the nature of the disease was discovered, the infection had spread to both lungs and Mom’s condition had weakened to the point that surgery was not an option. She would live the rest of her life with lungs that were slowly deteriorating.

In the mid-1960s, Hamill was sold to Firestone Tire & Rubber. Dad’s share of the sale allowed him to send Nancy, I, and David to private colleges, buy his dream car–a 1937 812 Super-charged Cord convertible–and buy property on the Platte River in Benzie County and build their retirement cabin. Though Mom and Dad had said on numerous occasions that they would never be “weekend warriors” and drive up north every weekend, once the cabin was finished, they spent weekends at the cabin. They referred to the area around the cabin as “God’s county”.

By this time, Dad’s situation at Firestone was becoming uncomfortable. Firestone required that all their senior managers have college degrees, which Dad did not. He resigned from Firestone and went to work for a competitor, American Safety Equipment Corporation. In the late 1970s, to be closer to home and reduce his travel, Dad went to work for Marsh Plating in Ypsilanti. In the eighties, he bought a share of Northwood Industries and worked as their sales manager with companies in southern Michigan.

In the late 1970s, Mom bought a building in Romeo and opened a combined antique store and quality dress shop called “the Cocoon and The Butterfly”. Due to ill health, she sold the shop in the late 1980s.

After 46 years, Mom and Dad divorced in 1989. Mom moved to the cabin and then purchased a condo in Benzonia overlooking Crystal Lake. She attended church and worked at the Benzie Museum. With her health failing, she moved into an assisted living facility.

On Friday, May 27, 1994, the assisted living facility employees called Nancy to inform her that Mom was not likely to last the day. Nancy called me and David, and the family rushed to Benzonia. I left Jamey and Kris’ track meet in Imlay City and made it to Benzonia in under three hours–normal time about three and one-half hours. Mom was tough but resigned to what was happening. Everyone got there and was able to spend time with her. She was in pain and receiving morphine shots, but her body wouldn’t let go. She survived through the weekend and Memorial Day. When the hospice worker got there on Tuesday, Mom asked her, “Why am I still here?” Mercifully, she passed on Wednesday, June 1, 1994. Her body was cremated and the ashes spread at the cabin.

Copies of the Almont Historical Society’s various books can be purchased by contacting Jim Wade at 810-796-3355 or jrwade49@gmail.com or stopping by the museum on Saturdays from 1-4 p.m.