George Albert Vadnais and Frances Catherine McHugh (Part 3 of 3)

Around 1941, the family moved to their forever home at 329 Campbell Avenue in White Bear Lake.¹⁵  Soon thereafter, on December 15, 1941, Fran gave birth to another son, Terrance (Terry) Joseph.¹⁶

Around the same time that the family moved to Campbell Avenue, George went back to White Bear Oil Company driving an oil truck.  By 1942 the company had purchased the Texaco station located at Washington Avenue and 3^rd Street in White Bear Lake.¹⁷  It had been the site of the Alden Saloon before Texaco owned it and built a gas station.  The Texaco station was remodeled and George became the proprietor.

On September 5, 1946, Fran gave birth to Susan Mary and on June 6, 1950 she gave birth to their last child, Karen Ann.^{18, 19}  Karen shared the same birth-day as her brother Jerry.  At the time of Karen’s birth, Fran’s mother, 71 year old Winnefred McHugh was living with them.²⁰  All of the children would be raised in the home on Campbell Avenue.

One of the places the family vacationed at was the “chalet house.”  Susan wrote that “When Terry, Karen & I were kids, during the 1950s, Mom and Dad would occasionally take us up to Duluth for a few days.  While there we stayed in a beautiful chalet-type home.  Thinking back, the chalet was more like a B & B.  We had a couple of rooms on the second floor & the owners would serve a continental breakfast in the morning.”²¹

George was a member of the Jaycees and the Lion’s Club, as well as the Knights of Columbus.²²  The mission of the Knights of Columbus was to empower Catholic men to live their faith at home, in their parish, at work and in their community.  George became an active member of the fraternal organization in the 1940s.  One of projects he was involved in was the reconstruction of the Fort St. Charles historic site on Magnusson Island in Angle Inlet of Lake of the Woods.  Fort St. Charles was the longest occupied French post in Minnesota and is the only French Fort in the state.  It had been abandoned in the mid-1750s.  To this day, the site is maintained by the Fourth degree Knights of Columbus of Minnesota and visitors are welcome.²³

Many memories were made as the children grew.  The youngest daughter Karen in later years wrote, “I remember coming home for lunch from St. Mary’s Grade School.  Mother always had a hot lunch ready for us.  Dad would leave before it got light out to go to work and he generally worked until dusk.  I remember feeling so proud of my sister and brothers.  I remember warm summer evenings sleeping out on the porch.  I remember Mother’s egg coffee, orange rolls and lemon meringue pie…  I remember playing outside after dinner with the neighborhood kids.  I remember the hot dogs and smores that we made in the fireplace in the backyard.  I remember the stories Dad used to tell about how we got Spotty [a Dalmatian], what it was like hand delivering oil to customers back in the olden days, stories of trips taken and trees cut down.  I remember seeing pictures of us taking a nap in our buggy out in the front yard with our loyal Spotty by our side.  I remember many happy times and no matter who visited our home, they were wished “God Bless You” when they had to leave.”²⁴

Besides running station #2, George also had a towing business associated with the station.  Most of the time, he, like all of his brothers, were on-call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in some aspect of the family business.

One of the work stories George told involved a tow job he went on.  He wrote that, “In the years that I’ve operated a tow truck in White Bear Lake, I have seen and heard many strange things and some I’d rather not remember, but one incident stands out.  It was a Sunday afternoon in winter.  I was busy at the filling station when a man walked in rather casually and said his car had broken through the ice of Bald Eagle Lake and would I pull it out.  He seemed in no hurry and so I asked him whether he could wait until my assistant came back to relieve me.  He said that would be fine and after a while my helper came back and the motorist and I set off in the tow truck.  The car was slowly slipping under water when I reached it just in time with my chain hook.  As I looked inside, I could hardly believe what I saw.  Sitting there, patiently waiting, were the man’s wife and small child, the water nearly up to their waists.  We got them out and they said they never doubted that someone would rescue them in time and yet I’ve always wondered why the man didn’t tell me he had left his family in that car, or why he seemed so nonchalant.”²⁵

George ran station #2 as a partner in White Bear Oil Company for 32 years.  By the time he retired from the business in 1974 at 64 years old, all of his children had married and moved out.  The retirement was short-lived, because in December 0f 1974 he opened a 10,000 Auto Parts store at 710 3^rd Street in White Bear Lake.²⁶

George did eventually retire, giving him and Fran more time to spend with each other and their family.

George was 84 years and 1 month old when he passed away on Sunday, May 1, 1994 at St. John’s Hospital in Maplewood, Minnesota.  He and Fran had been married almost 60 years.  The cause of death was a dissecting aortic aneurysm. 

Mass of Christian burial was held on Thursday, May 5, 1994 at St. Mary of the Lake Catholic Church in White Bear Lake, followed by George being laid to rest in the church cemetery.

Fran would live 7 years after George’s passing.  She was just 2 days shy of her 89^th birthday when she passed away on Tuesday, June 19, 2001.  The immediate cause of her death was acute ventricular fibrillation, the most serious abnormal heart rhythm.  A mass of Christian burial was held at St. Mary of the Lake Catholic Church on Saturday, June 23, 2001, followed by her being laid to rest next to her husband at St. Mary of the Lake Cemetery.²⁹

As I close this story I hear Aunt Fran’s sweet voice saying “God bless you dear.”

Thanks for visiting, come back soon,
Cynthia

© 2024 Copyright by Cynthia Vadnais, All Rights Reserved

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Footnotes for George Albert Vadnais and Frances Catherine McHugh post (part 3)