HOPE, Was My Best Friend
My name is Wilma Smith and I’d like to tell
you a true story about how I met the best friend I ever had, “Hope
Hickenlooper.”
In
January of 1940 Mother enrolled in Ogden Utah Business College where she
renewed her elementary school teaching credentials. That fall she was awarded a
contract to teach Special Education classes at Ogden’s Grant Elementary School.
Hill Air Force Base, a new supply and training center, opened south of Ogden
City. In the summer of 1941, my mother took a Civil Service examination at the
air base. She was immediately hired for a position in the Airplane Parts Supply
Division. Her new job paid a higher salary, better benefits as well as
opportunity for career advancement.
In
1942, my mother managed to buy old clapboard, two story home on Ogden’s upper
bench at 1128 Oak Street. The house needed serious cleaning and painting.
Friends helped my mother and I complete the cleaning and painting. We move into
the house during the summer of my fourteenth year. When classes began in
September at Central Junior High, I had a long walk to school; however church
was only one and one half blocks from home. The first Sunday in our new home,
Mother my brother Eldon and I walked to church for Sunday school at the
Twentieth Ward.
I met Hope in Sunday school. I was shy and
reserved while she was witty and outspoken. Her large brown eyes, dark hair,
and quick, friendly, joyous laughter immediately garnered my attention. She
approached me after class and said, “You moved into the house which is directly
through the block from where I live, shall we walk home together?” Thus began a
friendship which has endured for almost sixty years.
Hope and I were both born in 1927. We shared
many other background similarities. Her Mother Lottie Hickenlooper, a widow,
was a school teacher. My mother Mabel, also a widow, was a former school
teacher. Hope’s sister Jocelyn and my brother Eldon were handicapped. Each of
us had a half-brother from our fathers’ first marriage.
I
delighted in Hope. When we were young teenagers Hope’s family invited me to
accompany them on a long week-end vacation at the Bear Lake, Idaho Resort. Hope
and I conspired to use movie stars names at the resort when we introduced
ourselves to new acquaintances. Because I admired the movie stars Linda Darnel
and Veronica Lake, I became Linda Lake. Hope liked Lana Turner and Hedy Lamar,
Therefore she became Lana Lamar. While wading along the beach at Bear Lake we
met several interesting teen-age boys. They seemed smitten with our flirtations
and wanted to write to us. We were amazed the boys did not question the unusual
names. Two of the young men did indeed write to us. Hope and I discussed our
shared feelings of guilt and decided our easiest option was to not answer the
letters. For those few days we enjoyed the fantasy of being movie stars.
At the height of the world at war, Hope left Ogden High
School at the age of fifteen. She married Milan Coburn, a Corps man in the
Navy, recently graduated from Ogden High. They were stationed in Hailey, Idaho
for two years. After the war ended, Mike was accepted in the class of ‘46 at
Loyola Dental School University of Chicago. They had two children, Gene and
Karlene, and for the next two years Hope worked part time.
When Milan was a junior, Hope for reason I don't recall,
moved back to Salt Lake City, 452 Harvard Avenue with Muddie and her younger
sibling Wally. Karlene and Hope camped out in the dining room; Gene went to
live with his uncle Royal and his wife Genève in Payson, Utah.
I admired Hope's grit and determination. Even as she had to
return to work to financially support herself and Karlene, she maintained her
same bubbly, happy positive outlook. She the smartest person I ever met.
Through many of Hope’s and my life
challenges, struggles and passages, we gave each other encouragement and
support. Our letters written over sixty years included pithy and honest
observations as well as enduring, unqualified love and acceptance for each
other. I still have bundles of Hope’s letters.
Years
ago Hope and her fourth husband Bill moved from Ogden, Utah to Pocatello, Idaho
to be near Hope’s youngest daughter Janet and son-in-law Dan George and their
children. In the summer of 1997, Hope began experiencing health problems. I
received word last fall that Hope had suffer a stroke. She experience great
difficulty in walking but could still talk and write letters. When I last spoke
to her on the long distance telephone she seemed depressed. Near the end of our
conversation her spirits seemed to lift. Once again, for a few moments, I
enjoyed her lilting personality.
Three
weeks ago I was awakened by a vivid dream about my friend, Hope. In the dream
we were standing in back of a church, but were positioned on opposite sides of
the chapel. Hope was holding an open book and was trying to tell me something.
I said to her,
“Hope, I can’t hear what you are saying.”
The dream was so intense; I awoke with a
start and a feeling of concern for my friend Hope. I promised myself to call
her that evening, which was a Friday. Somehow I just could not place the call.
The following afternoon, when I returned home from a walk along the beach, a
call from Hope’s daughter, Janet, was waiting on my answering machine. Janet
told me her mother had passed away about 9:00 P.M. the night before.
A
psychologist might explain my dream as expressing an unconscious concern about
the health condition of a close friend. I prefer to believe my son Randy’s
explanation. Randy said,
“Mother, Hope was trying to tell you that her
book of life was about to close.”
Sadly enough, all came to end. Macular degeneration has taken its toll, and I’ll be moved to assisted living on 27th and Madison next week. Nothing lasts forever. The little acorn became a tree then it died. No leaves came in the spring. Nothing lives without loss, whatever it be, Sun, earth, moon; loss in a moment, of a passing thought, lost as quickly as it came. Loss of innocence, even one’s own self goes where the acorn ends.
