How we met.
I first saw Judy on a Wednesday afternoon before the Good Friday of 1962. It was in the UW Hoofers Lounge; she had on a very bright “alert orange” sweater. Everyone at Hoofers knew that a professor of microbiology had a E scow with an alert orange spinnaker and alert orang deck. She was probably trying to get his attention and she certainly got mine. Needless to say I thought she was very attractive and all the guys were flirting with her except the shy ones. So that was the first time I saw her, but she didn't’ see me. I sat on one of the lounge sofa chairs just plain exhausted from all my studies. The classic nerd.
Then on Thursday, I wanted to go sailing even though the ice had only been out for a week. Somehow, the Hoofer Sailing Club Pier was in place just a day or two after the ice was out. So that Thursday afternoon, a day you could see forever due to the clear dry Canadian air blowing in from the Northwest; I put the little 12 foot MIT Tech Dinghy into the water by sliding it off of the storage ramp into the water. Next, tugging the painter, I walked the Tech Dinghy to the middle of the pier. Then I tied the painter to the cleat on the pier and carefully pulled on the Dinghy to get it parallel to the pier so I could step into it. Then I proceeded to raise the sail. Now I was pretty well set to release the painter and go for a ride when I heard someone running down the wooden pier. I looked up and there was that girl who was wearing the alert orange sweater on Wednesday. She shouted “Do you need a crew”. I said “sure”. Then she pulled on the painter and got the front of the boat close to the pier and proceeded to step right on the bow of the Dinghy and it instantly rolled over and dumped me into the icy cold water.
Youngster on the front of a Dinghy ready to be fed to King Neptune.
She managed to get one foot back on the pier and only got slightly wet. I got out of the water pretty fast too. Since I was only 60% soaked, I proceeded to dry out some of my stuff from my pockets in the Fresh Air and bright sunlight. Moments later I showed this girl how the Tech Dinghy had to be positioned before one could step into it. Then I got in and said do you still want a ride? To my surprise she said yes. That first spring, Judy had lots of difficulty with Calculus & with my help she was able to ace the final and get a passing grade for the semester. We have been helping each other and sailing together through life ever since.
A 1965 picture of the actual pier that was there back in 1962.
Roughly thirty years later we got invited to make a substantial contribution to the revitalization of the Hoofers Lounge and now we have our name along with several others on an engraved plaque that is mounted in the Harold C. Bradley Hoofer Lounge.
For our 50th Anniversary, Our younger son presented us with an 18 x 24 inch framed picture of the current Hoofer's Pier. That picture now hangs in our living room. Below is a similar picture.
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