Robert Glen Lawrence

Robert “Bob” Lawrence Robert (Bob) Glen Lawrence was born May 31, 1924 to Prentis Omar Lawrence and Ennice Anieta Lawrence on a homesteaded ranch outside of Forsyth, Montana. At age 7 I moved with my parents and four siblings to my mother’s birthplace, Corning, Iowa. Five additional siblings were born in Iowa. The family lived on a rural farm during my grade school through high school years. I walked or rode a horse about two miles each way to a one room school house where one teacher taught first through eighth grade. The school house was heated with a free standing coal stove and toilets were two outside unheated privies-one for the boys and one for the girls. After graduation from eighth grade (age 14), I wanted to go to high school but there were no school buses and dirt roads were impassable after rains and heavy snow. My parents made a deal with a family on a farm two miles from town for board and room in exchange for work on the farm before and after school and throughout the summer. My bedroom was a small unheated room over the milk house with outside stairs. Many mornings in the winter I would wake up with frost on the covers. The family I lived with, the Dotson’s, had two small girls approximately 6 and 8. Mrs. Dotson was a large lady that ruled the house. She was very protective of the girls and I was only allowed in the house for meals and bathing. Mr. Dotson, a quiet henpecked husband enjoyed having a boy around. He was a hard worker and expected others to be the same. I would go to bed early since there was little else to do. We would all get up around 5:00 a.m. to milk cows and do other chores before breakfast, then change into clean overalls and walk to school. The girls went to a different grade school and Mrs. Dotson would normally drive them to school. I seldom got to ride to school but many times she would pick me up after school so I could get home quicker and start chores. I made some good friends with a couple of kids in my class who also lived on farms but had life a lot better than me. After the second winter at Dotson’s, I was invited by the parents of the other boys to come live with them and go to school. I gladly accepted the invitation and stayed with them for my junior and senior years. It was nice to sleep in a warm bed and be treated like one of the family. I graduated from high school in May 1943 and that fall was drafted into the military and chose the Army Air Force. My buddies received agriculture deferments to stay on the farm and raise food for a country at war. After basic training I was chosen to go to school in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to learn Morse code. After nine months of school, I was sent to Yuma, Arizona to learn to maintain and shoot a 50 caliber machine gun. After that I was assigned to an air crew on a B-17 bomber and trained for several more months at Sioux City, Iowa as a radio operator and waist gunner. In 1945 the war ended and our crew was dissolved. May of 1946 I was discharged at Walla Walla, Washington and sent to McChord field for final processing. At the time my Uncle Ben (Dad’s brother) asked me to stay in Tacoma, Washington and help him run a service station at north 46th and Pearl Street. I lived with Ben and his wife, Win, in a small two bedroom house beside the station. In addition to working at the station, I took some night classes at the College of Puget Sound. In 1948 they sold this station and bought another on Pacific Avenue in Parkland. I moved with them and worked there until 1949 and then decided to go to school full time at Knapp Business College in Tacoma. In May of 1950 I married Charlene Fellows and in October of that year was recalled into the Air Force. We spent one year at March Air Force Base in Riverside, California. October 1951 I was discharged again and returned to Tacoma where I worked for Herman Tenzler at Northwest Door. We bought a small house at 113th South L Street in Parkland. In 1952 we bought 15 acres at 176th in Spanaway where we cleared timber off and had a large house built by a family friend that did everything alone, including cement, roofing, wiring and plumbing at $4.00 an hour. We divorced in 1962. I joined the Elk’s Lodge #174 in Tacoma in 1955 and have been a life time member. I was installed as a Master Mason at Fairweather #82 in Tacoma in 1959 and went on to receive the 32 degree at Scottish Rite and Afifi Shrine in 1962. I met Carol in 1961 while at a dance on a blind date with other people. Carol’s boss, Dr. Piper, was also at the dance and introduced Carol to me. So we dumped our blind dates and spent the evening dancing together. We were married May 22, 1964, I was 40 and Carol was 33. In 1965 Northwest Door closed and I went with Wil Gonyea at Clear Fir in Springfield, Oregon. In 1972 I left Clear Fir and went with US Plywood. US Plywood sold to Champion International in 1978. At that time we were moved to Champion’s corporate office in Stamford, Connecticut where I worked until 1987 as a Sales Manager for 13 plywood mills West and South. March of 1987 we were blessed to be transferred back to Tacoma where I was a Sales Manager for the Western Plywood Mills. During 1987 we built our home in the quaint town of Steilacoom overlooking the Puget Sound, several islands, ferry boats, barges, whales, sail boat races and submarines. I retired in 1989. My greatest pleasure has been my marriage of 48 years to my wonderful wife and companion, Carol, and a father to her two children, Don and Cheryl. Written by Bob