I think one of the reasons why we got along was because we had a similar background. Carl was the only son of Carl and Olive Illig. Carl, Sr., had only a part year at A & M College. Olive had a High School diploma from old Central. She and her sister, May, were thrown on their own when their father married again and left Houston. They were thrown on friends, relatives and on their own. They became very independent and school teachers. Carl, Sr., took Olive to N.Y. via boat on their honeymoon. They later bought a nice home on Hyde Park Boulevard and had Carl, Jr.
Olive was a very good mother. She had lost her own mother when five and knew how it felt not to have a mother. When Carl, Jr.’s baseball team needed to go across town to play another team, they all crowded into Olive’s car with their one bat and played. Olive supported Carl in all his endeavors. When Carl went to new Central High and sat in the back row, he noticed a certain girl with blonde hair on the first row, but he didn’t speak to her. He was busy making good grades.
Arthur Gregg Horlock worked as a bookkeeper in Houston. He and Lillian Rose Fisher, who was very pretty, fell in love. Lillie was the youngest daughter in a family of 9, popular amongst her friends and well-loved by a family who gave her a huge wedding. The picture of the bridesmaids and the bride in their “Flora Dora” dresses is very outstanding and unusual. Never again in her whole life did my Mother have such a beautiful dress and such a beautiful occasion.
Arthur and Lillie went back to Navasota and stayed with his mother and father, Col. and Mrs. Robert A. Horlock, in their large nice home. The Horlock house in Navasota is now owned by the Heritage Society and they are planning a Centennial in May.) They moved into a cottage of their own and had Lillian and Fisher and stayed in Navasota for 5 years and then came back to Houston and lived with her mother and father, Mr. and Mrs. C. N. Fisher, in their home on McKinney (where the new library is today). Arthur worked for the Texas Company as an accountant.
Lillie never did have a home of her own, but she had the loving care of a family and constant help and love from her mother. It didn’t seem to matter that there was not much money; there was so much to do to get lessons, get Girl Scout badges, be in plays, etc. High school was hard, especially physics. She took 4 years of science and 4 years of Latin. Her home room elected her to be a favorite. She had the lead in a Church City play, The Brotherhood of Man.
Carl and Lillian both got into Rice. At the beginning of the sophomore year Carl spoke to Lillian. On their first date, Lillian showed Carl a picture of their mothers on a picnic together when they were young girls. They had both graduated from old Central High School.After Rice and 2 1⁄2 years at Texas Law School, Carl and Lillian married. The wedding was at the height of the depression. It was at Christ Church and a full church. There was only one attendant. There was no reception. The wedding dress was not white, simply because it would do as a dinner dress for parties in Galveston where they went that night to Carl’s apartment. He had moved to Galveston and had a job with Brantly Harris. They stayed there a year, getting only $50-100 the first year.
The only way they made it was because Olive came to live with them, sleeping on a fold-away bed in the living room in an apartment, paying one-third of the expenses, and bringing her car to be used. They all got along and it worked fine. Lunch could be a 10 cent can of deviled ham, a tomato, sandwich, a can of soup; then Carl would go back to the office via street car. After a year, Mr. E. E. Townes’ blind son, Chris, called Carl to come and work in the legal department of the Humble Oil Company.
We moved back into Carl’s previous home on Milford. Later, we had our first child, Elaine. Then we built our first home in West University on Coleridge at the cost of $3,000.00. We had Carol 6 years later and then 4 years later, Dale. Then we moved back to Milford for 5 years, and then to Tanglewood. Money was always hard to come by, but it didn’t make that much difference as long as we had enough for the basic things of life.
I was so busy bringing up 3 children, car-pooling, loving them, cooking healthy food for them, that I wasn’t really a good corporate wife. (I didn’t take the corporate life as seriously as I could have.) I was proud of our flock and thankful for them and anxious to be a loving mother.
For 41 years we have lived in Tanglewood. At first I was busy with P.T.A. and children’s dance clubs, fixing 3 different lunches, 3 different car pools, then all three going to three different colleges. Then 3 weddings. Then 6 grandchildren. Life had been very good. Carl worked hard and took an early retirement. This was good because he had eye trouble and he didn’t have to work as hard. Our careful spending of money and his smart investments gave us ample income.
I thank the Lord every day for my husband, my children, our home, our 6 grandchildren, and our life together.