Music • Photography • Writing
The
Bishops
Chicago
Years
Wolf
Place
Skyway
Park
Julie
West Oak
Bob and Marge were married July 12, 1944, at the Thorndike Hilton in Chicago, witnessed by Marge's sister Dot and Bob's uncle Bill. They arranged with a friend to take home movies of the ceremony but the camera failed for some reason so we have no images of the wedding, only a copy of their marriage certificate.
Bob and Marge went out to dinner for their first anniversary at the end of World War II. This shot, most likely taken by a photographer hired by the nightclub just for occasions like this, is the earliest we have of them as a couple.
The newlyweds honeymooned at the Lake of the Ozarks in Arkansas, where these pictures were probably taken. From the look of things, it was a non-stop thrill ride.
Back home in Chicago, it wasn't long before their union was blessed with their first-born, Elizabeth Cary Bishop, born June 9, 1945. The "Cary" was in honor of Carrie Anderson, her great-grandmother, though the spelling was changed. While she was still in the hospital, the nurses nicknamed her "Betty Boop," a popular cartoon character of the day. The name stuck and she still goes by Betty.
When Betty was still a toddler, the women of the family put together this four generation image: Carrie Anderson, her daughter Olive, her granddaughter Marge, and her great-granddaughter Betty.
In a more everyday image, Marge holds a rapidly growing Betty.
Bob has a relaxed moment on a porch swing with Betty and her new sister Laura. Laura Louise Bishop was born May 2, 1947, also in Chicago. I suspect that these relaxing moments were probably few and far between, at least judging by how antsy Betty's already getting.
A common sight on the streets of big cities like Chicago in the 1940s was the knife-grinder man, here seen fascinating young Betty and her friend. (In the contemporaneous comic strip Pogo, he was dubbed the "sizzle-grinder man.") This wooden cart was hand pushed down the sidewalks, where the practitioner would call out to the neighborhood that he was there to sharpen their knives and scissors. Note the large spoked wooden wheels, as well as the foot-cranked grinding wheel. Housewives probably welcomed his appearance as much as the neighborhood kids.
Even just with two toddlers, the Bishops look like they're still struggling to hold Laura and Betty still just for the fraction of a second a photo takes. Bob worked days at the Drexel Bank in Chicago and still worked several nights a week playing piano, now on the local Chicago scene. Marge worked for the phone company for a while but certainly had her hands full with the girls.
One sure-fire way to settle the kids down is to read them a bedtime story. Unfortunately, the girls still don't look like they're ready to settle down that much.
This may be the most disturbing photo in this collection. It's hard to say which is the more troubling expression: Laura's dark scowl or Betty's faux innocence. I dubbed this one "Trouble Waiting To Happen."
The trouble turned out to be Tom (Thomas Paul Bishop, June 1, 1950), who must have been just a new-born when Marge carried him out in front of their house on Green Street for a picture. A large baby, he proved strong enough to tip himself and his mother over backwards from the rocking chair. Tom landed on his head, which most agreed was the floor's misfortune. The mean streets of Chicago couldn't contain this growing family. So Bob and Marge's brother Ted drove out west, thinking they might head out to California. But along the way they stopped in Colorado Springs, Colorado, a quiet tourist town that had an odd affinity for people from Chicago. Bob wrote Marge a series of enthusiastic letters describing the town and the house that he'd bought and the prospects for work. The Bishops headed west.