My Beloved Martha

A few thoughts about Martha: When I first met Martha in Syracuse, NY I was living across the street from her home on Henry Street. One Saturday in 1959, after I had graduated from Syracuse (BFA, '58), I was raking up leaves and burning them in front of the apartment I rented along with my buddy, Dave Rusch. This cute young high school girl came across the street to tell me I could not burn leaves because it was against a city ordinance. She was very friendly and had a super sense of humor. I took an immediate liking to her. That began a long courtship, with many trips to the Syracuse water tower for necking (as it was called then). After graduation from high school, Martha went to "beauty school" and became a hair dresser. Soon, I was drafted in to the US Army and we were separated for 2 and a quarter years. When ever I took military leaves to my home in Utica, I drove to Syracuse to be with Martha, at that time known as "Martie." Our love grew strong over time. We communicated by mail, sharing our love.

We decided to get married. Soon after I was out of the Army we were wed in a Presbyterian church in Syracuse and honey mooned on Cape Cod and Gloucester, Massachusetts. I took a job at Syracuse University Press Printing Division. Soon we moved to Rochester for a new job at the University of Rochester. We lived on East Henrietta Road in a small one room apartment, which was actually a converted motel. Mark was born and we moved to Greece in North Rochester in a new town house to have more room for our new son Mark and his new brother, Brad.

Soon we had saved up enough money to buy a house on Castleman Road, our first real home, ( for $27,000). I worked at Rochester for 11 years, during which time I got my master's degree in Art History. Martha was a super home soulmate...we were in love! After a while, I wanted to broaden my experience, so I took a job in Princeton as an art director. We sold our house in Rochester to buy one in Pennington, New Jersey. We lived there for only one year. My job was a bad experience so I moved on to Dayton, Ohio where I worked for Wright State University and Martha was a study hall monitor in the high school. We had a beautiful house.... a so called "executive home."

From Dayton, we moved to Cornell in Ithaca, New York. There I worked as Assistant Director in Media Relations. Martha was the typical housewife, making friends with neighbors and attending the local Christian Science church. Martha was a very compassionate mom. Her favorite saying was "love is reflected in love," an idea from her church.

From snowy Ithaca we moved to San Diego. Martha worked as a receptionist at a computer medical firm. She was very successful. When I got the call to take a job at Stanford, Martha was right at my side and ready to support me. We moved to Mountain View, my current home. Unfortunately, in the summer of 1989, Martha died very suddenly. I lost my soulmate!

That is why this site is dedicated to her memory. Thank you for taking this "trip" with me down my memory lane.