1978 and another move

Our ex partner, Don Geary and wife Penny, owned a condo on Marco Island, Florida and they rented it to us for a week in the early part of 1978. We invited Irene and Gordon to get away from the snow and sub-zero weather of Montreal and join us and the four of us fell in love with the area and all that it had to offer. Back in Southern Illinois, we enjoyed our house and we were looking forward to my mother returning for a visit and this time brining her older sister - my aunt Peggy with her.
They stayed with almost three months alltogether and thoroughly enjoyed our country home, and going to the State Convention of BPW with me. I think they were both proud of my position as District Chairman.

But Dick and I kept thinking about Marco Island, and approached Bill and Frances, Leroy and Betty and June Ripley who all worked for in Topper Inc. and asked if they would be interested in uprooting from So. Illinois and moving to Florida with us. We offered to pay all moving expenses for them. Each one said yes, and in June's case her husband Ralph was ready to go too!!

During Mam and Aunt Peg's visit, we rented a house on the Isles of Capri (very close to Marco Island) for a month and we had a great time there. Bill and Frances, Leroy and Betty and Ralph & June all spent ten days each with us and during our thirty day there, and their individual ten-day stints, we all bought our new homes. Dick and I on Marco Island and the rest of them in Naples.

Our new home was right on the water, in an inlet leading directly out to sea. It was only two bedroom but absolutely gorgeous with a pool and dock. The house was owned by two very eccentric people and I asked if I could bring my mother and aunt by to see what we had bought as they would have returned to Wales by the time we took possession. They said yes, and we went over the next evening, to find them both very upset as they had just learned that their cat has leukemia. It also happened to be the cat's birthday. We had a nice visit there and left. When I flew down there a month later for the closing and to take possession, they presented me with a water bowl that had 'belonged' to their cat (now deceased) and they wanted my dogs to have it, because we had made the cat so happy on its last birthday and had given it such a good time! The bowl incidentally (which I still have and every dog we have ever had has used it) is an Abercrombie and Fitch original and they had paid $100 for it in the sixties!!!

It was hard giving up our house in Illinois as it really had turned into a show-case, and for me it was hard saying goodbye to all my BPW friends. They gave me a great send off and expressed some disappointment as I was on the way up the ladder in that organization and would have been appointed to a State chairmanship for 1978/79 and it would have been just three more steps to State President.

I have some great photos of our Marco home and will put them in the next blog with more stories of that island paradise......