James Francis "Frank" O'Rourke
Birth: 6 Feb 1892, San Francisco, CA
Death: 22 Mar 1979, Millbrae, CA
Spouse: Mary Pharayzn
Birth: 18 Jun 1897, Chicago, Illinois
Marriage: 4 April 1914, San Francisco
Death: 18 Jan 1985, Sonoma, California
Children: Francis Joseph (1915-2010)
James Vincent (1917-1997)
Vincent Joseph (1918-2003)
Elizabeth (Bette) Mary (1923-2009)
Death: 22 Mar 1979, Millbrae, CA
Spouse: Mary Pharayzn
Birth: 18 Jun 1897, Chicago, Illinois
Marriage: 4 April 1914, San Francisco
Death: 18 Jan 1985, Sonoma, California
Children: Francis Joseph (1915-2010)
James Vincent (1917-1997)
Vincent Joseph (1918-2003)
Elizabeth (Bette) Mary (1923-2009)
James Francis O’Rourke was born on February 6, 1892, at 1 Lundy Lane on Bernal Heights. Though he was born James, he went by Frank throughout his whole life. The family moved around the SOMA District before settling in on the 300 block of Harriett, in St. Patrick’s Parish. After the neighborhood was destroyed by the 1906 Fire, the family moved to 216 Texas Street, on Potrero Hill, in St. Theresa of Avila Parish. Like many young men of his generation, Frank had an eighth-grade education, after which he went into the work force. He worked as a newspaper carrier, and, according to the 1910 Census, he had achieved the position of “head boy” of the street newspaper venders at the age of 18. His grandson Gary, who interviewed Frank later in his life for a history project, said that he started delivering ethnic (Italian or German) newspapers. It did not pay very well, but the plan had always for him to get into the Teamsters Union like his father. By 1912, he was driving a truck for the Examiner, on route #26, and was in Local 960 like his old man.
According to his military records, Frank was 5’ 7”, slender (165 lbs later in life), with blue-gray eyes, light brown hair, and a ruddy complexion. Ranging from 5’ 10 to 6’, his sons would later tower over him, but his personality made him larger than life to them. Somewhere along the way, he met Mary Pharazyn.
According to his military records, Frank was 5’ 7”, slender (165 lbs later in life), with blue-gray eyes, light brown hair, and a ruddy complexion. Ranging from 5’ 10 to 6’, his sons would later tower over him, but his personality made him larger than life to them. Somewhere along the way, he met Mary Pharazyn.
Mary had been born in Chicago, Illinois, on Jun 18, 1897, to Paul Pharazyn and Leontine Bogart, immigrants from Belgium. She was the youngest of three children. Mary’s parents divorced when she was young, and her mother moved them to San Francisco after the Earthquake, where Leontine worked as a bottle washer. There must have been some sort of divorce settlement because she was able to buy the home at 1075 Gilman Avenue, which they rented to the Harry De Lee family. Leontine, who lived to be 96 years old, was a strong personality with a lot of business sense, and she passed that on to Mary.
Mary and Frank married on April 4, 1914. Frank was 22, and Mary was only 17, so she had to have a note from her mother allowing her to marry. They moved around Potrero Hill early in their married life together. Initially, they lived with Martin and Delia, but they moved across the street to 211 Texas after Francis was born. They moved to 217 Arkansas after Jimmy was born. In 1916, after Harry De Lee became a widower, Mary’s mother married him and moved into the home at 1075 Gilman Avenue. Frank and Mary left Potrero Hill for the Bay View District while pregnant with Vincent. Vincent was born at 1070 Gilman Avenue. They were renters there until 1922. In 1923, they lived at 1512 – 3rd Street. The next three years, they were at 1142 Hollister, then to 124 Silliman, then 866 Brussells. Finally, in 1926, they settled into 1032 Gilman Street, a new house Frank had built for the family down the street from Leontine and Harry.
Unlike other neighborhoods in town which might have a dominant immigrant group, the Bay View District was a melting pot in the 1920s. A look at the Census records shows Irish, Italian, Hispanic, Filipino, Swedish, German, Persian, Russian, and Greek families, all living on the same street. Ruth Upton’s article at FoundSF.org, about the street where she grew up, explains it well:
Le Conte Avenue was a short street, starting at the corner of San Bruno Avenue on the west and ending at Third Street on the east. On only one block—the western portion—were there houses, less than a dozen of them. Three were clustered at the corner of San Bruno. In the first lived Alexander Sanchez and his parents who were from the Philippines. Next door was the Lunardelli family consisting of the parents and their sons: Peter who attended Bret Harte with us and his adult brothers Italo and Inocho. The third house, a newish building of stucco, was occupied by Verna Michaelson, her mother (a Dane) and her stepfather, Mr. Borg, a Maltese. A huge grassy empty lot separated them from the last house on that side of the block where the Werner’s, Mr. and Mrs. and their boys, Henry and Robert. (They later moved to Woolsey Avenue in the Portola District and were replaced by “Babe” Werner’s sister, Millie Schmelter, her husband and their two older children, Marie and Johnny. (These two represented glamour for us younger kids. Tall and slim with steely blue eyes, Maria dressed in the latest fashion; her brother, big and blond, played football at Balboa High.)
See more at http://www.foundsf.org/index.php?title=1920s_Melting_Pot_in_Bayview
That block of Gilman was also diverse for its time. The 1930 Census showed people from Italy, France, Mexico, Greece, Puerto Rico, Alabama, Texas, South Carolina and South Dakota on the block. The O’Rourkes would live on Gilman for the next 25 years, moving up and down the block to each newly built house as they turned their previous home over to a newly-married child. Patty O’Rourke referred to Gilman Avenue as “the family compound.” The block only had nine houses—three of which the O’Rourkes owned—and over 25 empty lots. The family purchased several of the lots during the Depression. They had a paddock and four horses on one of the lots. By 1943, the family owned almost half the houses and lots on the block.
Mary and Frank married on April 4, 1914. Frank was 22, and Mary was only 17, so she had to have a note from her mother allowing her to marry. They moved around Potrero Hill early in their married life together. Initially, they lived with Martin and Delia, but they moved across the street to 211 Texas after Francis was born. They moved to 217 Arkansas after Jimmy was born. In 1916, after Harry De Lee became a widower, Mary’s mother married him and moved into the home at 1075 Gilman Avenue. Frank and Mary left Potrero Hill for the Bay View District while pregnant with Vincent. Vincent was born at 1070 Gilman Avenue. They were renters there until 1922. In 1923, they lived at 1512 – 3rd Street. The next three years, they were at 1142 Hollister, then to 124 Silliman, then 866 Brussells. Finally, in 1926, they settled into 1032 Gilman Street, a new house Frank had built for the family down the street from Leontine and Harry.
Unlike other neighborhoods in town which might have a dominant immigrant group, the Bay View District was a melting pot in the 1920s. A look at the Census records shows Irish, Italian, Hispanic, Filipino, Swedish, German, Persian, Russian, and Greek families, all living on the same street. Ruth Upton’s article at FoundSF.org, about the street where she grew up, explains it well:
Le Conte Avenue was a short street, starting at the corner of San Bruno Avenue on the west and ending at Third Street on the east. On only one block—the western portion—were there houses, less than a dozen of them. Three were clustered at the corner of San Bruno. In the first lived Alexander Sanchez and his parents who were from the Philippines. Next door was the Lunardelli family consisting of the parents and their sons: Peter who attended Bret Harte with us and his adult brothers Italo and Inocho. The third house, a newish building of stucco, was occupied by Verna Michaelson, her mother (a Dane) and her stepfather, Mr. Borg, a Maltese. A huge grassy empty lot separated them from the last house on that side of the block where the Werner’s, Mr. and Mrs. and their boys, Henry and Robert. (They later moved to Woolsey Avenue in the Portola District and were replaced by “Babe” Werner’s sister, Millie Schmelter, her husband and their two older children, Marie and Johnny. (These two represented glamour for us younger kids. Tall and slim with steely blue eyes, Maria dressed in the latest fashion; her brother, big and blond, played football at Balboa High.)
See more at http://www.foundsf.org/index.php?title=1920s_Melting_Pot_in_Bayview
That block of Gilman was also diverse for its time. The 1930 Census showed people from Italy, France, Mexico, Greece, Puerto Rico, Alabama, Texas, South Carolina and South Dakota on the block. The O’Rourkes would live on Gilman for the next 25 years, moving up and down the block to each newly built house as they turned their previous home over to a newly-married child. Patty O’Rourke referred to Gilman Avenue as “the family compound.” The block only had nine houses—three of which the O’Rourkes owned—and over 25 empty lots. The family purchased several of the lots during the Depression. They had a paddock and four horses on one of the lots. By 1943, the family owned almost half the houses and lots on the block.
The Bay View District was undeveloped at the time and almost rural. San Bruno Avenue and Third Street were among a very few paved streets. According to FoundSF.org, “Most families owned a car, but they were driven only by fathers on their days off from work. They were not used to go shopping or for frivolous errands. The men took the streetcar to work. Mothers did not drive.” According to Patty, Mary was one of the first women in the Bay View to have a drivers’ license. She drove a motorcycle with a sidecar, wearing an aviator cap and goggles!
Like most of the neighborhood fathers, Frank took the streetcar to work. Mary ran the home and handled all the finances. When Frank came home on Friday, he gave her his paycheck. Their sons did the same when they went to work. She did the property investing and taught her children about real estate.
According to their grandson Gary, during Prohibition, Frank and Mary ran gin. “Ma made the gin and Da made regular deliveries of O’Rourke’s Gin in his news truck.” San Francisco was a pretty open town at the time and little was done to enforce the Volstead Act, especially “out on the edges of town,” which the Bay View was at the time. This may have been why they were finally able to buy the house on Gilman
Summer vacations always included trips to Agua Caliente to visit Delia and Martin or camping in Cazadero. Camping in Yosemite was also very big for the family and was an activity that has spanned four generations. Back then, there was no road into Yosemite Valley. The family would drive or take the train to Mariposa and then ride the stagecoach into the Valley. The views were spectacular, but the ride along the river could be terrifying. On one trip later when they had a Model T to drive, someone they tried to give them a donkey. Frank actually got it the back seat before deciding the ride home with the donkey and the family squeezed together probably was a bad idea.
Like most of the neighborhood fathers, Frank took the streetcar to work. Mary ran the home and handled all the finances. When Frank came home on Friday, he gave her his paycheck. Their sons did the same when they went to work. She did the property investing and taught her children about real estate.
According to their grandson Gary, during Prohibition, Frank and Mary ran gin. “Ma made the gin and Da made regular deliveries of O’Rourke’s Gin in his news truck.” San Francisco was a pretty open town at the time and little was done to enforce the Volstead Act, especially “out on the edges of town,” which the Bay View was at the time. This may have been why they were finally able to buy the house on Gilman
Summer vacations always included trips to Agua Caliente to visit Delia and Martin or camping in Cazadero. Camping in Yosemite was also very big for the family and was an activity that has spanned four generations. Back then, there was no road into Yosemite Valley. The family would drive or take the train to Mariposa and then ride the stagecoach into the Valley. The views were spectacular, but the ride along the river could be terrifying. On one trip later when they had a Model T to drive, someone they tried to give them a donkey. Frank actually got it the back seat before deciding the ride home with the donkey and the family squeezed together probably was a bad idea.
Though Gilman was in St. Paul of the Shipwreck Parish, the O’Rourkes did not attend mass there. Being from Belgium, Leontine and Harry went to St. Joan of Arc Church, which was the French National church in Our Lady of Lourdes Parish. The O’Rourkes went with them. Later, they would attend All Hallows Church. The children never went to Catholic school, though. It was too expensive.
The Depression brought an odd change to the neighborhood. The Stock Market Crash combined with the nearby railroad yards introduced a new element to the Bay View—hoboes. Hoboes considered themselves different from “tramps” in that, when they got off, the train (either by choice or as a result of being thrown out by the railroad cops), they scrambled for work. If they were unlucky they knocked at doors asking for food. Immigrant families who had known hard times were often generous. The Bay View was one of the first San Francisco neighborhoods to have a homeless population, though it was not considered a “problem.”
Frank was a teamster his whole life. Probably the biggest incident of Frank’s career was the General Strike of 1934. It started with the Longshoremen’s Strike, which shut down ports up and down the West Coast. The response by the police was violent. In response to Bloody Thursday, when strikers were shot in the street, 21 unions, including the teamsters, voted to join the strike, which began officially on July 16th. According to The General Strike, an historical essay written by Chris Carlson for FoundSF.org:
July 17th also began a reign of terror targeting suspected homes and meeting places of radicals, subversives, and communists, including the offices of the Marine Workers Industrial Union (60 were arrested for being present), the Communist Party Headquarters, the Ex-Servicemen's Headquarters on Valencia Street, and several private homes. Dozens of armed men burst in, clubbed people, and smashed furniture and equipment. Police "mopped up" behind them, arresting 300 "radicals" in one day.
Charles Wheeler, vice president of McCormick Steamship Line, said in speaking to the Rotary Club that day that the raids would start soon, intimating that the government had given its approval. Arrested radicals were subject to immigration status inquiries and deportation, another indication of federal involvement in the repression.
The General Strike began to weaken almost as soon as it began. On top of the violent attacks by vigilantes throughout the city, the conservative Central Labor Council's Strike Committee authorized so many exceptions that they dramatically undercut the General Strike. On the first day, they allowed municipal carmen (streetcar operators) to return to work, ostensibly because their civil service status might be jeopardized. The Chairman of the Labor Council was Edward Vandeleur, who was also president of the same Municipal Carmen, and had opposed the strike since the beginning.
The Ferryboat men, the printing trades, electricians, and telephone and telegraph workers were never brought into the strike. Typographical workers and reporters continued to work on newspapers that spewed forth anti-strike propaganda. Labor Council leaders even went so far as to issue a work permit to striking sheet metal workers to return to their jobs in order to repair police cars.
By July 19th the General Strike Committee voted narrowly to end the Strike. On July 20th, the Teamsters voted to return to work, fearing that the Mayor's Committee of 500 and the Industrial Association would put strike-breakers on all the trucks in SF and leave the Teamsters without jobs.
It is unknown what part Frank played in the Strike, but it must have been an unsettling time, especially with a brother and a brother-in-law on the police force. Frank’s teenage sons were active on the picket lines and had their own stories to tell later in life.
In 1936, Frank and Mary’s first grandchild was born. Unfortunately, the situation was not the happy event for which most parents hope. A neighborhood girl had gotten pregnant, and Jimmy was the likely father. He denied it and, since paternity tests had not developed yet, it was her word against his. A well-accepted family story says that, in order to protect her son, Mary convinced other neighborhood boys to say that they had also had sex with the girl. The girl gave her son up for adoption, and he was raised as Robert Middagh. The secret was kept for many years. After Jimmy died, his brother Francis reached out to Robert, and the secret was broken to Jimmy’s other children that they had a big brother.
In 1940, Francis and Rose had Frank and Mary’s first recognized grandchild, Thomas Michael O’Rourke. Over the next 26 years, they would have 12 more grandchildren. At 74 members, the Frank O’Rourke Clan is the biggest subset of the Silk descendants. It is larger than the next two combined—the descendants of Juel Silk Fischer (34 people) and the descendants of Marion Ellison Scattini (32 people). That year, they sold 1032 Gilman to the Joseph Bruno family and bought the house around the block at 922 Hollister. This house backed up to Francis’ house at 1029 Gilman. Jimmy and his wife had moved into 1036.
In 1941, Ma and Da bought 1001 Gilman and turned the Hollister house over to Vince. For the next 10 years, this was the gathering place for the family for Sunday afternoons and for weekday gossip sessions.
In 1950, SF Unified School District decided to relocate Bret Harte Elementary School from where it had been on Key Avenue to 1035 Gilman. Several houses and lots were taken under “imminent domain,” including 922 Hollister and all the odd numbered houses and lots on Gilman from 1001 to 1049. The Hollister house, where Vince was living, was moved around the corner to a lot at 1101 Gilman. Vincent moved to Cora Street in Visitation Valley. Frank and Mary sold 1001 Gilman to the City for $11,000 and moved two blocks away into 2924 Griffith Street. This kept them in the neighborhood and close to Leontine. Betty and Frank had been living in the house, so they move to a house on Arleta, two blocks from Vince and down the block from another house that Frank owned. After moving the house at 1029 across the street, Francis also moved to Arleta, up the block from Betty. Jimmy stayed in the neighborhood, moving his house further up Hollister.
The family was very tight-knit. Leann Gilbert remembered that they were always visiting each other’s houses and catching up on who was doing what. Jimmy’s daughter Camilla remembered that, almost every Sunday, “the clan” gathered for lunch on Griffith Street. All the cousins would get to run around together, while the adults talked and laughed. Mary always served the same thing—salami, cheese, and French bread. That never changed.
Frank loved animals. He was very proud of his horse and his dogs. Moving later to an apartment where they could not have pets was difficult for him. At least he was able to keep his canary. Mary was not much of a fan of pets.
In 1957, Frank retired from the newspaper game, but he did not sit still. Frank Gilbert got him a job with the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department where he worked for another ten years as a part-time watchman. Frank’s father had done something similar on the waterfront before retiring to Agua Caliente. They also had two motels in the South Bay—the Sunnyvale Motel and the Star Hotel in San Jose.
Mary and Frank had their little vices. Mary was a chocoholic, and Frank loved a good cigar. With Mary’s financial wheeling and dealing in real estate, it is not particularly surprising to find out that she liked to gamble. Her grandchildren all remembered her putting on her mink coat, getting in the big Oldsmobile or Cadillac with Frank, and driving to Reno.
By 1962, the Bay View/Hunters’ Point neighborhood had changed again. After the War, people who had immigrated to the area to work in the Shipyards were out of work. The only affordable housing was in the former Naval Barracks, which were well below acceptable. In the later 1950s, the salvation of the neighborhood was supposed to be the new baseball stadium, Candlestick Park. There was some economic revitalization, but not enough for all the unemployed in the neighborhood. In 1962, the Alice Griffith Housing Projects (also known as Double Rock) opened just a block away from Gilman Avenue. Frank and Mary moved into 19 Redondo, where Mary’s mother had been living there alone since Harry died in 1956.
In 1964, Frank and Mary celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary. It was a fairly small affair, held at their daughter Bette’s house in Millbrae. Many of the family were there. When Frank toasted them for 50 years of marriage, Mary drew a big laugh when she responded, “More like 50 years of misery.” Mary could tease like that, but Frank was devoted to her.
In 1967, Mary’s mother Leontine passed away. Frank and Mary stayed on Redondo for two more years and then moved into the flat at 1415 Dolores Street. His sister Maude lived upstairs. They held onto the Redondo Street house and rented it to a Henry Woodard. Their granddaughter Camilla remembered that the flat on Dolores was always dark because the blinds were always drawn. Mary did not want people seeing in. If she visited when Mary went out, Camilla would open the blinds and windows to air it out. Always the animal lover, Frank missed his dogs and horses, but he had a canary. When the canary died he was very upset, especially since “Ma won’t let me get another canary.”
Always friendly and gregarious, Frank liked to walk around the neighborhood to see what was happening and to talk to people. He was particularly interested in the new BART tunnels that were being dug nearby. One day, he got too close, fell into the hole, and broke his hip. He had to have a bolt or screw put in while his hip healed. After the doctor removed it, Frank kept the bolt as a memento of his adventure.
The year 1977 was a pivotal one for the family. Irene passed away in January. Maude moved to Sonoma to be nearer to Vera and to her grandchildren. Frank’s health was failing and he moved into a rest home in Millbrae. At the same time, Betty’s husband retired, and they decided to move to Agua Caliente permanently. Mary moved to Sonoma as well, where she lived alone in a second-floor apartment.
The Depression brought an odd change to the neighborhood. The Stock Market Crash combined with the nearby railroad yards introduced a new element to the Bay View—hoboes. Hoboes considered themselves different from “tramps” in that, when they got off, the train (either by choice or as a result of being thrown out by the railroad cops), they scrambled for work. If they were unlucky they knocked at doors asking for food. Immigrant families who had known hard times were often generous. The Bay View was one of the first San Francisco neighborhoods to have a homeless population, though it was not considered a “problem.”
Frank was a teamster his whole life. Probably the biggest incident of Frank’s career was the General Strike of 1934. It started with the Longshoremen’s Strike, which shut down ports up and down the West Coast. The response by the police was violent. In response to Bloody Thursday, when strikers were shot in the street, 21 unions, including the teamsters, voted to join the strike, which began officially on July 16th. According to The General Strike, an historical essay written by Chris Carlson for FoundSF.org:
July 17th also began a reign of terror targeting suspected homes and meeting places of radicals, subversives, and communists, including the offices of the Marine Workers Industrial Union (60 were arrested for being present), the Communist Party Headquarters, the Ex-Servicemen's Headquarters on Valencia Street, and several private homes. Dozens of armed men burst in, clubbed people, and smashed furniture and equipment. Police "mopped up" behind them, arresting 300 "radicals" in one day.
Charles Wheeler, vice president of McCormick Steamship Line, said in speaking to the Rotary Club that day that the raids would start soon, intimating that the government had given its approval. Arrested radicals were subject to immigration status inquiries and deportation, another indication of federal involvement in the repression.
The General Strike began to weaken almost as soon as it began. On top of the violent attacks by vigilantes throughout the city, the conservative Central Labor Council's Strike Committee authorized so many exceptions that they dramatically undercut the General Strike. On the first day, they allowed municipal carmen (streetcar operators) to return to work, ostensibly because their civil service status might be jeopardized. The Chairman of the Labor Council was Edward Vandeleur, who was also president of the same Municipal Carmen, and had opposed the strike since the beginning.
The Ferryboat men, the printing trades, electricians, and telephone and telegraph workers were never brought into the strike. Typographical workers and reporters continued to work on newspapers that spewed forth anti-strike propaganda. Labor Council leaders even went so far as to issue a work permit to striking sheet metal workers to return to their jobs in order to repair police cars.
By July 19th the General Strike Committee voted narrowly to end the Strike. On July 20th, the Teamsters voted to return to work, fearing that the Mayor's Committee of 500 and the Industrial Association would put strike-breakers on all the trucks in SF and leave the Teamsters without jobs.
It is unknown what part Frank played in the Strike, but it must have been an unsettling time, especially with a brother and a brother-in-law on the police force. Frank’s teenage sons were active on the picket lines and had their own stories to tell later in life.
In 1936, Frank and Mary’s first grandchild was born. Unfortunately, the situation was not the happy event for which most parents hope. A neighborhood girl had gotten pregnant, and Jimmy was the likely father. He denied it and, since paternity tests had not developed yet, it was her word against his. A well-accepted family story says that, in order to protect her son, Mary convinced other neighborhood boys to say that they had also had sex with the girl. The girl gave her son up for adoption, and he was raised as Robert Middagh. The secret was kept for many years. After Jimmy died, his brother Francis reached out to Robert, and the secret was broken to Jimmy’s other children that they had a big brother.
In 1940, Francis and Rose had Frank and Mary’s first recognized grandchild, Thomas Michael O’Rourke. Over the next 26 years, they would have 12 more grandchildren. At 74 members, the Frank O’Rourke Clan is the biggest subset of the Silk descendants. It is larger than the next two combined—the descendants of Juel Silk Fischer (34 people) and the descendants of Marion Ellison Scattini (32 people). That year, they sold 1032 Gilman to the Joseph Bruno family and bought the house around the block at 922 Hollister. This house backed up to Francis’ house at 1029 Gilman. Jimmy and his wife had moved into 1036.
In 1941, Ma and Da bought 1001 Gilman and turned the Hollister house over to Vince. For the next 10 years, this was the gathering place for the family for Sunday afternoons and for weekday gossip sessions.
In 1950, SF Unified School District decided to relocate Bret Harte Elementary School from where it had been on Key Avenue to 1035 Gilman. Several houses and lots were taken under “imminent domain,” including 922 Hollister and all the odd numbered houses and lots on Gilman from 1001 to 1049. The Hollister house, where Vince was living, was moved around the corner to a lot at 1101 Gilman. Vincent moved to Cora Street in Visitation Valley. Frank and Mary sold 1001 Gilman to the City for $11,000 and moved two blocks away into 2924 Griffith Street. This kept them in the neighborhood and close to Leontine. Betty and Frank had been living in the house, so they move to a house on Arleta, two blocks from Vince and down the block from another house that Frank owned. After moving the house at 1029 across the street, Francis also moved to Arleta, up the block from Betty. Jimmy stayed in the neighborhood, moving his house further up Hollister.
The family was very tight-knit. Leann Gilbert remembered that they were always visiting each other’s houses and catching up on who was doing what. Jimmy’s daughter Camilla remembered that, almost every Sunday, “the clan” gathered for lunch on Griffith Street. All the cousins would get to run around together, while the adults talked and laughed. Mary always served the same thing—salami, cheese, and French bread. That never changed.
Frank loved animals. He was very proud of his horse and his dogs. Moving later to an apartment where they could not have pets was difficult for him. At least he was able to keep his canary. Mary was not much of a fan of pets.
In 1957, Frank retired from the newspaper game, but he did not sit still. Frank Gilbert got him a job with the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department where he worked for another ten years as a part-time watchman. Frank’s father had done something similar on the waterfront before retiring to Agua Caliente. They also had two motels in the South Bay—the Sunnyvale Motel and the Star Hotel in San Jose.
Mary and Frank had their little vices. Mary was a chocoholic, and Frank loved a good cigar. With Mary’s financial wheeling and dealing in real estate, it is not particularly surprising to find out that she liked to gamble. Her grandchildren all remembered her putting on her mink coat, getting in the big Oldsmobile or Cadillac with Frank, and driving to Reno.
By 1962, the Bay View/Hunters’ Point neighborhood had changed again. After the War, people who had immigrated to the area to work in the Shipyards were out of work. The only affordable housing was in the former Naval Barracks, which were well below acceptable. In the later 1950s, the salvation of the neighborhood was supposed to be the new baseball stadium, Candlestick Park. There was some economic revitalization, but not enough for all the unemployed in the neighborhood. In 1962, the Alice Griffith Housing Projects (also known as Double Rock) opened just a block away from Gilman Avenue. Frank and Mary moved into 19 Redondo, where Mary’s mother had been living there alone since Harry died in 1956.
In 1964, Frank and Mary celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary. It was a fairly small affair, held at their daughter Bette’s house in Millbrae. Many of the family were there. When Frank toasted them for 50 years of marriage, Mary drew a big laugh when she responded, “More like 50 years of misery.” Mary could tease like that, but Frank was devoted to her.
In 1967, Mary’s mother Leontine passed away. Frank and Mary stayed on Redondo for two more years and then moved into the flat at 1415 Dolores Street. His sister Maude lived upstairs. They held onto the Redondo Street house and rented it to a Henry Woodard. Their granddaughter Camilla remembered that the flat on Dolores was always dark because the blinds were always drawn. Mary did not want people seeing in. If she visited when Mary went out, Camilla would open the blinds and windows to air it out. Always the animal lover, Frank missed his dogs and horses, but he had a canary. When the canary died he was very upset, especially since “Ma won’t let me get another canary.”
Always friendly and gregarious, Frank liked to walk around the neighborhood to see what was happening and to talk to people. He was particularly interested in the new BART tunnels that were being dug nearby. One day, he got too close, fell into the hole, and broke his hip. He had to have a bolt or screw put in while his hip healed. After the doctor removed it, Frank kept the bolt as a memento of his adventure.
The year 1977 was a pivotal one for the family. Irene passed away in January. Maude moved to Sonoma to be nearer to Vera and to her grandchildren. Frank’s health was failing and he moved into a rest home in Millbrae. At the same time, Betty’s husband retired, and they decided to move to Agua Caliente permanently. Mary moved to Sonoma as well, where she lived alone in a second-floor apartment.
Frank passed away at the rest home on March 22, 1979. He was not quite 87 years old. Services were held at Reilly & Co., with Mass at St. Paul's Catholic church. Burial was at Holy Cross Cemetery in Section R2.
Mary survived for six more years. She died on January 18, 1985, in Agua Caliente. She was 87 years old. She is buried with Frank in Holy Cross Cemetery.
Mary survived for six more years. She died on January 18, 1985, in Agua Caliente. She was 87 years old. She is buried with Frank in Holy Cross Cemetery.
Frank and Mary made an interesting couple. Frank was known as one of the most relaxed, kind, generous people around. Similar things were not said about Mary. She could be sharp-tongued and difficult to be around. But they were inseparable. When they would visit Jimmy, he would say, “Here they come…ham and eggs.” They were married for 65 years. They had four children together and 13 grandchildren and 18 great-grandchildren. Frank was devoted to her and she was devoted to him in her own way.