When the relatives moved out in 1932, Beatrice needed to move to a small apartment with her three children. Dogs were not allowed. Billy cried into Skippy’s white fur and hugged his dog tightly. On moving day, his mom took the dog to live with a family on a farm outside Cleveland. To soften the blow, she crammed Skippy’s cedar doghouse into the back porch of the apartment for Billy and the boys in the neighborhood to use as a clubhouse.
A couple of years later, when Billy turned eleven, thirteen-year-old Mary became his babysitter. Jimmy moved to a boarding school. Billy took advantage of the situation, running the streets with the neighbor boys. Mary couldn’t control her little brother. One day, he climbed a billboard and tossed a tomato at an unsuspecting young man who was on a date with a young lady. Billy scurried down the pole and ran. The man chased after him and grabbed him by the neck. As Billy dangled, the man said, “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you!”3 Red-faced, the man gave Billy a swift kick in the pants and sent him on his way. The other boys watched the scene unfold, and in the eyes of his friends, Billy became an instant hero.
Billy’s family moved into this small apartment on West 120th Street in 1931. The building had a strict rule: No dogs allowed!
Photo by Nancy Roe Pimm
But the boys didn’t always cause trouble. They fished, rode bikes, and played sports. They crushed a can for a puck and used brooms for sticks in street hockey games. They played baseball in a sandlot with flat stones as bases. The boys shared baseball mitts because so few had a mitt of their own. They also played tag, kick-the-can, and hide-and-go-seek. Bill later said, “I wouldn’t trade my childhood for anything in the world.4
Unfortunately, Billy concentrated on life in the streets more than his schoolwork and had to repeat sixth grade.
In seventh grade, Billy worked at a pool hall/bowling alley to help his mother pay the rent. He set up bowling pins for four cents a game. When his shift ended, Billy walked home, getting to bed at two o’clock in the morning. One day, when Billy fell asleep in class, Sister Bertha nudged him awake.
She said, “Are you still working in that pool room?”
Bleary-eyed, Billy looked up at his teacher and said, “Yes, Sister.”
Sister Bertha nodded and said, “All right. Go back to sleep.”5
In search of cheaper rent, the family moved again, this time to a small home on Cleveland’s west side. One day, while walking home from school, Billy came upon a stray dog without a collar. He praised the dog. He patted the dog. He gave her candies from his pocket. All the way home he said, “C’mon, girl. C’mon.” When he found his mother in the kitchen, Billy told her “a little white lie.” He said, “Mom, look at this dog. She followed me all the way home. I couldn’t get rid of her. I think she needs me. Can we keep her?”6 Billy promised to look after the dog, and his mom finally gave in to all of his pleas.
Billy named the dog Queenie. Soon she surprised them by giving birth to a litter of six puppies. Billy gave all the puppies away. About two months later, tragedy struck. A few blocks away from their house, Queenie was hit by a car and died. Billy’s best friend tried to cheer him up by giving back one of her puppies, a little male named Pal.
During spring, summer, and fall, Billy and Pal spent their days hiking through the woods and tramping through the marshes filled with frogs and water birds. Billy taught the dog to sit, stay, speak, and fetch. Then he taught Pal more difficult tricks. On command, Pal would leap six feet in the air and swipe the hat off Billy’s head. When they crossed a busy intersection, Billy signaled for Pal to jump into his arms. The two were inseparable. When winter rolled around, they went sledding with the boys in the neighborhood. Pal not only rode down the hill on his own sled, he also pulled the sleds back up the hill with four or five ropes held in his mouth.
Billy majored in horticulture and photography at West Technical High School in Cleveland, Ohio.
Photo by Nancy Roe Pimm
Every day at 3:30, Pal patiently sat out front of Billy’s school, waiting to share the one-mile walk home. One day, when the school bell rang, Pal wasn’t there. Billy informed everyone in the neighborhood about the dog’s mysterious disappearance. He also went to the Animal Protective League and asked for their help. For months, he thought he would find his dog, but he never saw his trusted friend again. Bill remembers, “I was so heartsick that I vowed never to be that close to anyone again—animal or human.”7 At the age of sixteen, Billy’s heart had been broken—not by a girl, but by a dog.
That fall, Billy enrolled in West Technical High School. They offered machine shop, aviation engine repair, electrical shop, photography, and much more. Because of his love for everything outdoors, Billy enrolled in horticulture. He needed more credits, so he added a course in photography.
By the time he turned seventeen, the family had moved ten times because of financial difficulties. Billy still struggled in the classroom, but he loved sports, especially football. He worked hard every season and finally made varsity in his senior year. The coach said, “If everyone worked as hard as Wynne, we’d have a heck of a team.”8 While training for his final season, Billy suffered a career-ending injury: torn ligaments in his right knee. With his poor grades always an issue, he overheard his family saying once again, “I wonder what’s to become of Billy?”9
DID YOU KNOW?
Bill Wynne was inducted into West Technical High School’s Hall of Fame on September 22, 2006. West Tech was the largest high school in Ohio with over five thousand students enrolled in 1939. With such a large student body, they had six football teams—three junior varsity and three varsity teams. The school closed its doors in 1995.
3
LOVE STRUCK
The secret to a good life is turning all of your disadvantages into advantages.
—Bill Wynne1
THE WYNNE FAMILY moved to Joan Avenue in the spring of 1940. At this point, eighteen-year-old Billy went by the name of Bill. Bill became close friends with a neighbor boy named Bob Howard. Bob considered himself to be popular with the girls. One day, he convinced Bill to prank the cute girls in the neighborhood by calling them on the phone, pretending to be someone else. He dared Bill to call a particular girl named Margie, since she was the type to hang up. Bob called Margie “the girl who had never been kissed.” Bill accepted the challenge and dialed Margie’s number. For one month, Bill called Margie daily, but he never revealed his identity. They had long conversations, some lasting over an hour.
At the end of each call, Bill asked permission to call again. Every day, Margie answered coyly, “If you want.”2
Bill wanted to tell Margie that he was “the mystery caller,” but every time he walked to the other end of Joan Avenue, to talk face to face, Margie ran into her house. One day, Bill told Margie’s sister, Helen, that he had been trying to meet her sister for over a month, but every time Margie saw him coming, she went inside and wouldn’t answer the door. Helen devised a plan.
