LAUGHING THROUGH THE YEARS
DICK AND AUDREY BIXBY, 1943.
Is You or Is You Ain’t My Baby
— LOUIS JORDAN & BILLY AUSTIN, 1944
Dick and Audrey Bixby met in high school, but Audrey had had her eye on Dick for quite a while. “He was tall and handsome,” she recalled. “My girlfriend and I used to drive our bikes around his house, hoping to spot him.” By the time friends set them up, Audrey already had plenty of other fellows interested in her. That didn’t sit well with Dick. “I walked her home from school and I told her she was going to be my girlfriend or I was going to be long gone,” he said.
That declaration motivated Audrey. “I decided I didn’t want to let a good one go!” And seven decades later, she’s still happy with her choice. In their cozy living room, the couple laughed and teased each other as they recalled their courtship. Once Audrey decided to make Dick her only boyfriend, she never looked back, even when Dick and his family moved away after his graduation.
Audrey, an only child, had grown to love Dick’s boisterous family. “I lost my mother at 13,” she said. “Dick’s mom was my mother from the time we met.” Shortly after the Bixbys moved, Audrey’s father took a job in Alaska. Sixteen-year-old Audrey didn’t want to move to Alaska, so she asked her dad if she could live with her aunt and finish school in Seattle—which just happened to be where her sweetheart and his family lived. Her father agreed and Dick and his mother arrived to help her move. “He came to get me in a Model A Ford with a rumble seat!”
While Audrey loved being included as part of the family, she said, “There were so many things I just didn’t get! Like, they’d start water fights and I would run and hide. To this day, I don’t like water being thrown at me!”
Dick laughed. “She really didn’t get it.”
His wife shook her head. “I still don’t!”
Dick served his apprenticeship at a machine shop, and after graduation Audrey found work at a local bank. On December 7, 1941, the couple planned to go ice skating. “We heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor on the radio,” Dick recalled. “We didn’t quite realize the extent of what it would mean to us.”
A new job sent him to Salt Lake City, but the separation from his sweetheart proved too much. “It was understood that we’d marry from the time he told me to get rid of all the other boys,” said Audrey. He sent her an engagement ring by mail and after six months in Utah, he decided to hitchhike home. “She was my girl,” Dick said. “And I missed her.”
There weren’t many cars on the road due to gas rationing, and Dick finally arrived in Seattle sporting a painful sunburn. The first thing he said after greeting her was “Let me see the ring!” Unfortunately, Audrey had been so nervous and excited to see him that she inadvertently left her engagement ring on the bathroom sink at work, and she was horrified by having to tell him. But true to form, he laughed. Thankfully, the ring was recovered.
BIXBY WEDDING, AUGUST 22, 1942.
They married in her aunt’s home on August 22, 1942. “I didn’t have enough money to buy both wedding dress and a going away suit, so I got married in a wool suit,” Audrey recalled. “It turned out to be the hottest day of the summer!” When Dick signed in at the hotel for their wedding night, he realized he had much to learn about being a married man. “I signed in just myself,” he said, laughing. “I told the clerk, ‘I’m new at this!’”
As World War II intensified, Dick could have received a deferment because of his work as a machinist. “But I chose to join the Navy,” he said. After basic training he was sent to Pasco. “I cleaned barracks and cooked in the galley,” he said. But soon his true talents were discovered and he was asked to supervise the aircraft repair facility. “He was in charge of the battery shop” Audrey said. “He did a good job, so they left him alone.”
His wife soon joined him, and they rented an upstairs room in an older home. “We lived in that one big room for two years,” Audrey recalled. She struggled to learn housekeeping skills. “Dick taught me how to cook after we were married—more or less!” One afternoon she decided to bake a pie to serve guests that evening. “I was rolling the crust out with a milk bottle and I couldn’t get it to roll out right. I was crying,” she said. So she did what she usually did—she asked her husband for help. He’d been working on their car, and though he washed his hands before rolling out the piecrust, evidently he didn’t do a thorough job. “The pie had black flecks in it!” Audrey said. But they served it to their guests anyway, and laughed while telling them the story. “I still don’t like to cook to this day!” she said.
Audrey admits she didn’t know anything about babies either, but that didn’t stop her from wanting one. “At that time, we thought the war was never going to end and I wanted to start a family, so we did!” In April of 1945, their daughter Nancy arrived. She weighed only 5 pounds and Dick admits to being taken aback by his first glimpse of her, unprepared for how tiny she was. They didn’t have much time together, as Dick was soon transferred to San Francisco. After he left, Audrey and the baby moved in with Dick’s sister. In October of 1945 he was discharged from the Navy and reunited with his wife and daughter.
The birth of their son, David, in 1948 completed their family. Anxious to settle down, they purchased a new home in 1950. “We paid $60 a month,” said Audrey. “And we lived there 43 years. Dick added a huge family room and a swimming pool. We had so many parties! We’d roll up the braided rug and dance. Oh, we had such good times!”
After many years of successful employment, Dick became his own boss. His father had started Bixby Machine and Supply and when he wanted to retire, Dick purchased the business from him. Audrey worked with him doing accounting and ordering, and the business thrived. “It was fun,” she said. “We made so many friends! We stayed after work and customers would hang out and visit us.” She smiled fondly at Dick. “We had good years working together.” When they were ready to retire, they sold the business to their son.
DICK AND AUDREY WEARING THE FUR COAT DICK BOUGHT HER, 1943.
Pulling out a photo album, Dick pointed to a picture of an 18-year-old Audrey, “This is who I fell in love with,” he said. He choked up—her recent illness had unnerved him. Composing himself, he enumerated her attributes, concluding with the two most important to him. “She’s an awfully nice person and she laughs at my jokes!”
Suddenly, the tears he’d fought back filled his eyes, and Audrey reached out and patted his hand. “He’s always been proud of me.” She leaned forward and confided, “I still dress up for him.” As for their long years together, she was matter-of-fact. “In those days that’s what you did. You stayed married. You worked at it and you didn’t toss it aside if things weren’t all smooth sailing.”
Her husband cleared his throat. “It’s simple,” he said, earnestly. “Do what your wife says.” Then a huge grin split his face and Audrey rolled her eyes.
“We still have a lot of fun,” she said, and added with a grin, “Just not as much.” And once again, laughter filled the room.
LOVE LESSON
“Treat your spouse with as much courtesy and politeness as you would a guest in your home.”—Audrey Bixby
DICK AND AUDREY BIXBY, 2010.
Dick Bixby died September 24, 2013