My dad was born in Fayette, MO, December 27, 1899. His father, Robert E. Lee Hancock, was a grocer and his mother, Zebbie, did her best to populate the entire state of Missouri. Dad was the tenth of eleven children, five of whom were dead when he was born--shows how the good old days were not all that good. He grew up in Fayette and even attended college there, Central College (now Central Methodist College). He played football and baseball and his love for sports continued all his life. He majored in history which was the real intellectual interest of his life. Anyone who knew him knows that he could recite chapter and verse about Roman history, the Civil War, baseball, or other subjects because he seemed to have an encyclopedic memory of facts. His grandchildren still remember him telling them all sorts of trivia, but with such enthusiasm that they couldn't ignore it.

He served in the Army, after being drafted, for a grand total of 43 days in World War I. Even then, he did not leave Fayette. He stayed on the campus of Central College for the entire time. They marched with wooden guns and he rose to the grand rank of acting-Corporal for a few days until the real Corporal got out of the hospital. (In the 1960s, Missouri sent all veterans a check for $100, which he then endorsed to me. His headstone was issued by the Veterans Administration with the rank of Private, U. S. Army. He would be proud.) After college, his first job was teaching in Liberal, Kansas in the far-southwestern corner of the State. After a year, he moved to Palmyra, MO. Somehow he met my mother who lived and taught in Hannibal, a short distance away.

Dad took the job in Imperial in 1942. He was Principal of IVUHS and Superintendent of the school district which then consisted of the high school and three segregated elementary schools, Lincoln (White), Roosevelt (Mexican), and Dunbar (Black). However, as most know, there were also several county schools which fed kids into the various high school districts of the county. One interesting sidelight was that the high school district went as far east as the Southern Pacific Railroad tracks on the east side of the sand hills. Every school district was allocated a section of the tracks and got some amount of taxes from the railroad, and in order to do this, had to pick up kids if they lived there. Fortunately, no one lived in the sand hills, at least not in Imperial's district, although one of the bus routes to north of Holtville was well over 40 miles long. Dad was always concerned about the segregated elementary schools and the legality of the situation, but that was standard in the Southern California area. I think he knew deep down that the preparation for high school was substandard, especially at Dunbar, which had two teachers for eight grades. As lawsuits mounted, primarily in Orange County, my dad and others saw the hand-writing on the wall and the school board closed Dunbar and converted Roosevelt to a junior high school at the end of the 1949 school year. (I think the fact that Roosevelt was destroyed by fire in 1947 had some impact on the decision since the new Roosevelt School was so much better than either Lincoln or the high school.) Dad coached the football team one year early in his tenure--not sure what year--and he loved it. I remember that Imperial played in Brawley that year and did well and the team came by the house on the bus on the way back to town to give him the news. He was sick and couldn't' t go to the game. My mother started teaching in Imperial in 1942, although this was not her plan. Whoever was under contract to teach history and civics didn't show up for the first day of school. (All the teachers were usually hired in Los Angeles through the California Teachers Association and it was hard to talk people into moving to the Valley.) Since teachers were not available, my father hired my mother for the year. The next year, she switched to English, and continued to teach at IVUHS until the end of the 1950 school year. In addition to teaching English, she served as an advisor on the Junior and Senior class plays. The proscenium arch in the study hall of the old high school was ideal for this. Regrettably, class plays went away with the demolition of the high school She also did a lot of college counseling. I think this was really a very satisfying task for her. Many of the students would be the first member of a family to go to college. By encouraging applications, she felt that she was really expanding horizons which is, or should be, the basic motivation for any teacher. She decided to leave Imperial because she had to teach me. One year teaching me was enough, and she felt that it was not fair to me to have the principal and one of the teachers in the family. She taught one year in an elementary school in Brawley and then switched to teaching English in Calexico High School. She continued to teach in Calexico until I got out of college in 1958. As much as we all liked the old high school, it had a lot of drawbacks. There was no gymnasium and basketball was played in the American Legion Hall. At one end of the court a fast layup meant a hard collision with a wall. At the other end, you could go through the front door and I guess, at least in theory, you could end up in the street. (Prior to that time, the only basketball court was an outdoor wooden court behind the high school.) Right after WWII, Dad went to Sacramento, and secured funds to construct a new gym. I am not quite sure when it was completed but it was about 1949 or 1950. (Because of post-war material shortages and the boom in construction, it was hard to obtain structural steel and there was a long wait after orders were placed. As luck would have it, the steel for the gym was shipped by truck from Los Angeles. The driver went under a railroad bridge and the entire load was dumped in the highway. Because of extensive damage to the beams, the wait started all over again and it took months to get construction started again.) After the gym, the next project was a replacement for the old high school. To say it was not earthquake resistant is an understatement. The old high school was closed mid-year in the 1950-51 school year. Dad obtained some WWII barracks from the Naval Air Station at Seeley. Some of the barracks were set down on the tennis court close to Lincoln School (no wooden floors, just the concrete of the tennis court) and the others across the street on a vacant lot. Construction took two years and the new high school was occupied in the Spring of 1952. Dad continued in his job until 1956 when he resigned. He then went into something he knew absolutely nothing about. He bought a concrete pipe company in Imperial that made concrete drainage tile. Considering that he had practically no mechanical ability, it took a lot of guts. However, it was a big success and he did well financially. He, of course, had to compete with Ryerson Concrete in El Centro. Fortunately, he could do so because he concentrated on just 4, 6, and 8 inch tile where Ryerson made all sizes of pipe. In 1960, my folks bought a house in La Jolla and moved. My mother was not in good health and the Valley was not a mild climate to say the least. She had osteoporosis and later on developed Parkinson's Disease. Dad commuted regularly to the Valley for a few years to keep Quality Tile going. However he shut the plant in the mid-sixties after moving the plant once. Both of my parents loved La Jolla and it gave Dad a chance to play more golf which he had played since the 1930s in Corona. My mother passed away in March, 1965, from the combination of ailments she had suffered with for several years. For quite a while she was an invalid and it was really terrible that my parents were not able to enjoy retirement for a longer period. Like a lot of men who are suddenly alone, he did not exactly treat his body with care. He ate well (too well) and really did not care for himself as he should have. My father remarried in July, 1966. Caroline was, after my mother, the best thing that happened to him. Caroline was a physical therapist and a splendid golfer which was wonderful for Dad. She did a lot to shape him up, especially after a heart attack in 1971. She watched his diet for him and he lost weight. If it had not been for her he would have either died because of the heart attack or soon thereafter. In effect she added years to his life. They finally left La Jolla in 1973 and moved to Solana Beach. The traffic on the streets of La Jolla made driving almost impossible. In addition they did not require a big house and the house they found in Solana Beach was ideal. It overlooked the ocean and was within 4 miles of a golf course. Another reason was that they traveled a lot, primarily all over the Western United States and a smaller place was easier to maintain when absences were common. My father had purchased some golf irons from a guy who made clubs in his garage in Minneapolis during the summer and played golf in La Jolla in the winter. This guy fell dead walking off the 18th green at Torrey Pines. Dad always said that wasn't a bad way to go. On August 3, 1983, Dad died on the 17th tee at Whispering Palms Country Club in Rancho Santa Fe. I have always felt his drive was either too good or awfully bad. Either way, it was a good way for him to go even though it was a shock to Caroline, and to me and my family. By the way, Caroline is now 82, still playing golf twice a week, and in good health.

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