Genealogy Windsor-Cicognani » Robert Holm Pilcher (1912-2005)

Données personnelles Robert Holm Pilcher 

• Il est né le 8 août 1912 dans St. Louis Park, Michigan, USA.
• Il est décédé le 28 novembre 2005 dans Juneau, Wisconsin, USA, il avait 93 ans.
• Les parents biologiques sont Franklin Preble Pilcher et Lily Marietta Holm
• Cette information a été mise à jour pour la dernière fois le 10 juin 2014.

Famille de Robert Holm Pilcher

(1) Il est marié avec June Elaine Anderson.Source 1

2 ADDR
3 STAE Minnesota
3 CTRY USA

Ils se sont mariés le 12 mars 1938 à Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, il avait 25 ans.

Enfant(s):

1. (Ne pas publique)
2. (Ne pas publique)

(2) Il est marié avec (Ne pas publique).Source 1

2 ADDR
3 ADR2 Redmond
3 STAE Washington
3 CTRY USA

Ils se sont mariés le 9 mai 1997 à Lionsgate, il avait 84 ans.

Notes par Robert Holm Pilcher

2 ADDR
3 STAE Minnesota
3 CTRY USA
2 ADDR
3 STAE Alaska
3 CTRY USA

BIOGRAPHY: Notes for IRIN # 8, Robert Holm Pilcher

Note that Robert is ½ Swedish and ½ English, since his father was 100% English and his mother 100% Swedish.

20 Sep 1913 postcard from Etta to Norma, mailed from Joliet: ...Robert behaved nicely on the train and has so far today... [Another on Sep 22 says] ...Mama and Robert are fine. Robert is a good boy when away from home.

BIOGRAPHY: The following was told to me (Charles A. Pilcher) by my Dad in about 2001. It tells of how he ended up moving to Alaska.

BIOGRAPHY: The headline in the morning paper on Monday, January 3, 1959, announced that Alaska was now the 49th state in the union. Reading that, I picked up the phone on my desk in the crew scheduling office at Northwest Airlines and called the IRS. A Mrs. Smith answered the phone. "I'm interested in working for the IRS in Alaska," I told her. "That's great," she replied. After a few basic questions on background, she told me"We're looking for people right now. When can you come down and take the test?"Two days later I was in the IRS office in Seattle taking an eight hour multiple choice exam on federal taxes. It was pretty clear from the answers that two were ridiculous and two were possible. Most of them weren't too bad, and on Friday, January 7, Mrs. Smith called back to report my results. "You passed with flying colors. Would you like "audit" or "enforcement?" she asked. It didn't take me too long to figure that audit would confine me to a desk for the rest of my life, whereas enforcement would get me out of the office and among the people. The fact that, as a "tax cop" I probably wouldn't make any friends in the job didn't really bother me. I just wanted something more than a desk job, so it didn't take me long to respond, "Enforcement.""Great!" Mrs. Smith exclaimed. "We have openings in Fairbanks, Anchorage and Juneau." We talked a bit, and once she found out I had two kids, she suggested "Fairbanks wouldn't be a great place for kids.""Let me think about it over the weekend," I said, and went home and told June for the first time that I had just been offered a job with the IRS in Alaska. While not at all excited about the idea, June called the library, got hold of a knowledgeable staffer, and learned that the cost of living in Fairbanks was 35% higher than Seattle, Anchorage 25%, Juneau 15%, and Ketchikan 10%... but there weren't any openings in Ketchikan. Given that the IRS was going to pay me $300 per month less than I was making at Northwest, but also a 25% cost of living allowance for Alaska, we agreed on Juneau. On Monday, January 10, 1959, I called Mrs. Smith back and accepted the job.I went to Anchorage for five weeks of training on April 20, and lived in Joe Halm's basement. By about the first of June, I was in Juneau, where I met Jacques Norvell, the other agent, and moved into a two bedroom duplex in Douglas. The kids and June arrived in mid June.Red Holloway was my first collection account. He owned the local cab company, and one of the first things he said to me was, "You know, Mr. Pilcher, I have a license to carry a gun. And in case you're interested, when I applied for the permit and they asked why I wanted to carry a gun, I told them "so I can shoot Jacque Norvell." Many years later, he gave me and Lora Mae a full set of new tires for our wedding.Old timers like Alex MacRea and Walt Kirkness were opposed to statehood, as it meant more taxes and fewer benefits.Cleveland Burley of another early collection case also became a lifetime friend, as did many others throughout Southeast Alaska on whom I called.

On April 21, 2002, I (Chuck) heard my Dad recall for the first time his mother's funeral. "There were several long, large black horse-drawn carriages/hearses, all pulled by black horses. I was there with Bessie and Norma,and ? Frank, inside one of these carriages in the long procession out to Lakewood Cemetery. I could see forward out a window of one of these hearses and see the driver's legs hanging down over the window. I was wearing something like a black suit with a fancy shirt, cap and patent leather shoes. This was quite a large funeral, and there was a real crowd of people at the cemetery."
He goes on: "Later that summer I remember taking all of my toys and going out in the yard and throwing them all into a big hole that was left around a big old elm tree in the back. They had sort of dug up the back yard and left the elm, building sort of a 'crib' around it so it could get light or something. I just threw all my toys in the hole. Probably the next summer after that, I went to the neighbor's house. Beside their wide front steps at the bottom were two big urns full of plants or flowers. I was mad and pushed those pots over."

Family remembers that as Robert grew older he was "always in trouble." Bob has a friend, Pearce Chell, from his childhood.Pearce's mother used to tell Aunt Hilma "Coarse children fight, but Bob beats Pearce so unmercifully."

Dad remembers attending Fern Hill School in St. Louis Park as a youngster. They moved to SLP sometime during his childhood, possibly during a period of rather rough times before Dad was 10-14 years old.

Dad remembers sort of "living off the land" there, where they had some livestock. Dad recalls milking a cow there.

Bob is said to have saved a Dayton Hudson truck driver about 1924 neartheir house on Minnetonka Blvd. The truck went down a bank onto its nose, rolled onto the driver and began smoking (or steaming?). Bob took a garden hose to the fire(?) while "Don just ran around and watched."

Pilcher kids received a nice letter from Aunt Birdie in Oakland after their father's death.

There is/was allegedly a ring that my Mom owned that may have been given to Barbara, my (CP) wife. That ring was originally given by Frank Pilcher Sr. to his wife Lily Etta on the occasion of my Dad's (Robert's) birth. All my Dad asked for after his father's death in 1930 and the split up of the family was that ring. The rest of the kids took the furniture, etc. Dad gave the ring to my (CP's) Mom, June Pilcher, on the occasion of MY birth. Mom then felt it should go to my wife, so Barbara supposedly has it (though as of 30 Dec 2012 she says she never had it.) The center stone was supposed to be the August birth stone [peridot, aka sardonyx / CP], surrounded by diamonds, August being the month of my Dad's birth. (Told to me by my Dad, 29 Jun 1990). It thus appears that this ring, if found, should be passed on to my son Jeffry, to give to his wife on the occasion of the birth of their first child. NOTE Nov.1, 201O: Barbara says that the only ring she has is one that was originally gold and that she got when she and Leanne went through my Dad's jewelry after he died in 2005. She had it reset, and the only things left that are original are the tiny diamond accents. The center stone is now a CZ and there are two dark sapphires or opal on each side next to it. There is another ring that Lora Mae Ross Bourland Pilcher has that might fit the bill. But the story is not as clear as the notes I took above in 1990, and Barbara does not recall getting any ring from my Dad after my Mon's death in 1985 (though I myself vaguely recall otherwise.)

There is a man's signet ring that I (CP) have that has been handed down through the Pilcher family. There should be a note about that ring elsewhere in these notes.

After Dad and Mom were married they went to Niagara Falls on their honeymoon. A year later they drove out west, a 6600 mile trip in a '38 Ford. There is a picture of them standing in front of a house, numbered 1907, taken the day they left on that trip.

In 1933 Dad, Don and a friend named Bill Plantin decided to go to the World's Fair in Chicago. They saw that the railroad was hiring people to water cattle enroute from So. St. Paul to Chicago, and headed off for So. St. Paul. When they got there, the jobs were all gone. They were already a long ways from home, so decided to keep going. They hopped freight and rode all night, in an open car with smoke in their faces, arriving in Chicago so black that they looked at themselves and just laughed. They washed up in a stream near the rail yard, got directions to the El to get in to Chicago, paid their ten cents and went in to the YMCA. They got a room in the Y right where the El made a turn, so that both the noise and the headlight from the El as it came in and rounded the turn, shined right in to their room. Not a good night's sleep, for which they paid about fifty cents apiece. The next morning they got up, went to a diner with a really long tiled counter and Dad ordered prunes for breakfast. The server scooped out a bowl of prunes and slid it the length of the counter, spilling prune juice then whole way. They went for lunch at an "all you can eat" plaace, and for 50 cents let the manager glare at them as they stuffed themselves. That night they found a place to sleep under a statue of some guy mounted on a horse in a park on about Michigan Avenue and State Street, near a bridge that went across to the World's Fair, built on an island out in Lake Michigan. Dad tied his ditty bag to his ankle, covered up with newspaper, and some guy tried unsuccessfully, to steal his bag shortly after he fell asleep. The next morning, Sunday, they got up (the belly of the horse dripped water on them all night), washed up in Lake Michigan, went to the fair for 2 days, slept in the same place the third night, and hopped another freight home. In Olwein, Iowa, another freight switching point, they met a 10 year old street-wise kid who was riding the rails to see his mother in Michigan. He taught the three guys more about riding freights than they ever knew. There is a photo of Bob and Bill Plantin in the freight yard in Chicago in Dad's photo album.

23 April 1938 invoice from the Forster Furniture Co. [June Anderson's brother-in-law/CP] to Robert H. Pilcher for furniture purchased on March 31 and April 12: Dav/chair, Buffet, China, Table/chairs, 2 Mattresses, 2 Springs, 9X12 Rug, Pad, Mop, Polish, Vanity/chest/bench/bed, Nite stand, Bed: Total = $536.60, less Allowance of $140.60, Net = $396.00. [to furnish a five room house!/CP]

Sep 1961 letter to Mary Ethel from Norma: We (Stan and I0 went to Alaska in June. We drove. Nice trip. Bob is living there now - will be for another couple of years. [HA!!!/CP]

I just returned from a visit to Juneau to see my Dad and Lora Mae Ross Bourland Pilcher [that story needs to be in here somewhere!] and noted that at 88 years of age, Sep 6, 2000, my Dad is still able to bound up stairs two at a time. He chose to walk up the State Office Building stairs in Juneau rather than take the elevator, and was ahead of me the whole time. He also mentioned a couple of ski trips around St. Louis Park as a kid where he tried to save a rabbit who was being held by the throat by a weasel, and another time when he picked up what he thought was a dead weasel from a trap and after carrying it in his pocket for a few minutes, it jumped out. /cp

Re the marriage of Robert Holm Pilcher and Lora Mae Ross Bourland… Lora Mae is my (CP's) mother-in-law. After Herb Bourland died in about 1996, Barbara and I took a trip to Maui in 1997 with the kids. I decided to take my Dad too, so Barbara decided she'd invite her Mom. The two of them had known each other through holiday gatherings or occasionally playing cribbage, which my Dad had taught Lora Mae. While Barbara and I were out for a run one morning, we were walking back up Wailea Drive toward the Ekahi condo where we were staying and looked up ahead. Barbara said "Look at that older couple up there walking hand in hand. Isn't that cute." As we got closer, we realized it was our parents. That was February. They were married in May by our son-in-law, Pastor Jim Kress, in a family ceremony at Lionsgate Townhomes (where we were living after our home burned in March) in Redmond, WA. They were 85 and 75. They were married 8 ½ years before my Dad died in 2005.

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