Obituaries
Remembering Uncle Bill
Lorna Rumsby, Sooke, BC
Volume 28 Issue 10, 11 & 12 | Posted: December 29, 2014
My name is Lorna Rumsby. I am the eldest of Bill’s fourteen nephews and nieces. We are evenly split: seven Rumsbys and seven Zipps. Now I am here to tell some stories from Bill's life as I remember them. Some of them might even be true.
When Bill was young he was friends with the Phillips boys, Eric and Richard. He was also friends with Phyllis. Phyllis remembers Bill delivering newspapers on his bike and sometimes he’d be late. Phyllis’ neighbour was not always pleased by the delay in his newspaper delivery so Phyllis and Bill would resort to subterfuge. Bill would hide the paper under a tree and Phyllis would pretend to suddenly find it and say to the neighbour, “Oh, here it is.”
My name is Lorna Rumsby. I am the eldest of Bill’s fourteen nephews and nieces. We are evenly split: seven Rumsbys and seven Zipps. Now I am here to tell some stories from Bill's life as I remember them. Some of them might even be true.
When Bill was young he was friends with the Phillips boys, Eric and Richard. He was also friends with Phyllis. Phyllis remembers Bill delivering newspapers on his bike and sometimes he’d be late. Phyllis’ neighbour was not always pleased by the delay in his newspaper delivery so Phyllis and Bill would resort to subterfuge. Bill would hide the paper under a tree and Phyllis would pretend to suddenly find it and say to the neighbour, “Oh, here it is.”
Phyllis Phillips remembers being part of a group of young people, including Bill, which would meet at friends’ houses, clear the furniture out of the kitchens and dance the night away square dancing while the parents were playing cards in the living room. Phyllis says they had a great time. Bill and Phyllis would polka and Phyllis and Eric would square dance.
Bill is well remembered in the Phillips family as they give him credit for introducing Phyllis to Eric or maybe vice versa and the Phillips children all called him Uncle Bill. I remember how I was surprised while working with Betty Phillips Low in the bank, to find out that her Uncle Bill was also MY Uncle Bill.
After Phyllis and Eric were married there was an incident with a washing machine. Phyllis had arranged to obtain one in Victoria and Bill helped out by borrowing his brother Larry’s pickup truck to move the machine to Sooke. As they were driving out to Sooke (the road was much more winding and crooked than it is today), Bill asks Eric how the washing machine is doing. Eric says: “Oh, it’s fine. It’s standing back down the road at the corner waiting for the bus.”
On those occasions when Mom (Betty) was providing us with another sibling, my brother, Steve, and I would be farmed out to Grandpa’s and Grandma’s (Nettie’s and Frank’s) house by the sea in Saseenos. At that time, Uncle Bill was still living at home helping out his parents, attending to the things his father couldn’t as Frank was rather crippled with arthritis.
We would sleep upstairs in Auntie Joan’s room and freeze to death at night even though Bill would put a hot “stone pig” in our beds to warm them up. In the morning, Bill would make breakfast, usually jam on toast made with those old wire toasters that you had to flip with a twist of the wrist to get each side of the bread toasted. I thought this kind of fascinating as we didn’t have that kind of toaster at home. Then Bill would drive us to Sooke Elementary School.
Saseenos Elementary School didn’t exist at that time, and anyway, Larry and Betty lived on the wrong side of the bridge. Only the students living on the other side of the bridge could go to Saseenos Elementary School. Several of the Zipp kids, (Joan’s children), got that privilege. They lived on the “right” side of the bridge.
One of the goals of the Rumsby kids' when young (and maybe, the Zipp kids, too) was to try and persuade Uncle Bill to give them a ride in his shiny, clean, brown MG sports car, preferably with the top down. We didn’t have much luck with that goal.
I only remember one ride in that sports car. To explain, perhaps, why the nieces and nephews didn’t get a ride, Uncle Bill would tell us that any time he thought about getting married and having kids, he would come down to Larry’s and Betty’s and the chaos and confusion unfolding there would always change his mind. Until he met Kathryn Blizzard and that’s another story.
One summer day, lost now in the mists of time, Mom and Dad and all us children, were invited to an afternoon party at the home of some friends of Bill’s, people we didn’t know very well. We weren’t too sure what the party was for but everyone went with great curiosity because we had heard a rumour we were going to meet Bill’s current girlfriend, something we hadn’t been permitted to do before.
Bill was there with other guests. There was a crowd. We were introduced to different people but no girlfriend. We went home rather mystified because we didn’t meet any girlfriend of Bill’s. It turned out Kathryn was there. Family legend says that the whole Rumsby family were invited so Kathryn could meet us en masse to see if we would pass muster with her. I guess we did as the rest is history. Nothing like having an interview without knowing you were being interviewed.
Many of you may already have heard about the day that Bill and Kathryn announced their engagement, but I will tell it again for the benefit of those who have not heard it yet. It clearly illustrates how the Rumsby clan may not communicate as efficiently as they could and should.
One warm sunny day, the two of them, Kathryn and Bill, came down to Larry and Betty’s for coffee as they were wont to do from time to time. I was there with several family members enjoying lunch with Mom and Dad. Bill and Kathryn sat down at the table with us. We all immediately noticed the lovely ruby ring that Kathryn was flashing around on THE important finger. We all waited for them to tell us their good news.
And waited and waited. Finally, after a couple of hours, Bill and Kathryn got up to leave. Everyone said goodbye. Finally, in desperation, just before she went out the door, Kathryn bursts out: “Aren’t you going to ask us about the ring?” We all spoke at once: “We were waiting and waiting for you to tell us but the longer you took to tell us the more we were afraid to mention it!”
There was one frightening event in Bill’s life when he was in his mid-thirties, long before he met Kathryn. He was involved in a very serious car crash on Highway 14 by Portage Inlet that totalled his beloved MG and almost killed him. I remember the anxiety of my parents and grandparents as we all waited to see if Bill was going to survive. He was in the hospital for quite a long time. I remember seeing Bill’s bloody clothes soaking in basins in the bathroom. In the end, the clothes were probably burnt as unsalvageable.
As a result of the accident, Bill had a tracheotomy in his throat for many years and strangers had problems understanding him when he spoke. Eventually, Bill got a nose job, among other things, and his speech improved one hundred percent. However, he never got another sports car although he remained a member of the Victoria Sports Car Club and, over the years, he and Kathryn planned and hosted several car rallies for the club members.
Years ago, Bill drove down to spend the Christmas holiday with the Zipps and he took all his presents for the family wrapped up beautifully in Christmas paper, through Customs, with no problems. (It was easier in those days, as you can imagine.)
When Bill’s gifts were opened on Christmas morning, Joan received a bowl filled to the top with Japanese mandarin oranges. This was a great treat for the Zipp family as they didn’t get to eat them often. Japanese mandarins were not allowed across the border because the USA wanted to protect its orange industries in Florida and California.
As some of you know, Bill was very fond of Nanaimo bars and my mother was very good at baking them. Bill ate many delicious meals at our house over the years. If we phoned him up at the last minute, he wasn’t offended. He’d just put his dinner in the fridge for another time and hurry on down the hill.
He came to all our happy family events, celebrating lots of milestones over the years and when he married Kathryn, she was welcomed into the family. She managed to keep all the Rumsby kids’ and all the Zipp kids’ names straight (remember there are 14 of us) and whether she ever felt overwhelmed by the clan she never said. When the family gets all together, even to this day, the noise of everyone talking at once at the top of their lungs is fairly awesome to experience.
With the encouragement of his mother, a school teacher, Bill was a voracious reader and, happily, so was Kathryn and their house always had books piled all over the place. Surprisingly, since Dad, Uncle Bill and Auntie Joan never had any pets when they were growing up, as far as I know, once Bill married Kathryn, they always had cats. To my amazement, the cats tolerated the leash and they were able to accompany Bill and Kathryn on their many RV trips across Canada.
Bill was a fairly heavy smoker for many years and he didn’t get much exercise other than work. That changed after he had a heart attack in his sixties. He quit the cigarettes (for which Betty was very thankful) and people in Sooke could see him religiously getting in his daily walk for the sake of his health, come rain or shine.
This last spring, while Bill was in hospital many friends and family visited him and he was very pleased to see so much evidence of people’s affection for him. It was returned as Ed Zipp, one of the 14, wanted me to tell you. One day in March, Ed went to see Bill at the VGH. During their conversation, Bill says to Ed: “You know, you were always kind of weird as a kid and you still are.” Ed replies: “I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“I thought you might.” Says Bill.
Bill worked hard for 45 years to first, get Sooke Elderly Citizens Housing Society (SECHS) started (finances organized, etc.), then built and then to keep it going. He spent some years as chairperson of the SECHS board and he always kept his hand in even after his health began to fail.
He had originally thought that he would have the facility up and running by the time his parents, Nettie and Frank, might eventually need it but that didn’t happen and Bill was the first family member to make use of SECHS’ services. He lived there for 15 contented days and we thank SECHS for their kindness to him during his life’s final chapter.
Finally, Bill along with his brother, Larry, was one of the longest serving members of the congregation of St. Rose of Lima Church. He invested his ideas, heart, time and effort into the church, both the former building on Sooke Road (on the other side of the bridge) and now this new one you are in today.
His faith was an important part of his life and he will be remembered by his many friends in the congregation where he spent many a Sunday morning after Mass, gabbing over coffee and cookies. He certainly loved the coffee klatch as many of you know.
We are all pretty sure that he will be keeping a keen and benevolent eye on the progress of St. Rose and its congregation for many years to come. Bill, we are all glad to have known you.
Lorna’s eulogy at St. Rose of Lima, Sooke on July 5, 2014.
Lorna Rumsby, Sooke, BC