Life of Wry

Apropos of nothing, at least nothing having anything to do with today, I am posting a photo that just made me smile.

May I present the Hesse girls (and one random husband):

I truly love these gals (Art, too, Karen’s husband, but for my purposes here, I’m just going to give a wee backstory on the Hesse girls).

Their dad, Fred, hired my dad in the early 50s. My dad had graduated from Stanford with an MBA, had worked a couple of starter jobs in Northern California, and then, reading the tea leaves, applied for a job in aerospace — the go-go industry of the 50s in LA. He and my mom headed down to Redondo Beach where my dad interviewed with and was subsequently hired by Mr. Hesse for a job at Space Technology Laboratories (which I believe was started by engineers Thompson and Wooldridge, who later partnered with Ramo to form TRW). My dad and Mr. Hesse (who’d just graduated from Harvard) were two of the earliest employees of STL –> TRW, when, literally, there was just a couple/few dozen folks. They would work together for the next 30+ years and grow TRW to became a huge powerhouse in the aerospace and defense industries (with the eventual help of 9000+ employees at Space Park in Redondo Beach, and who knows how many other employees in the other four divisions of the corporation).

Anyway, Fred and his lovely wife Betty lived in a beach bungalow down on 39th Street in Manhattan Beach and suggested to my dad and mom that they consider a bungalow down the street that was available to rent. Which they did.

There was a third couple, Ed and Bev Osborne, who also lived on 39th. Each couple, at that point kidless, was young (in their early to mid-twenties!) and at the beginning of their work lives. The three couples became fast friends. Each started cranking out kids like there was no tomorrow. Pretty soon they each had to relocate to accommodate their growing families: the Hesses moved to a large ranch house in Rolling Hills and had six kids (5 girls, 1 boy), the Petersons moved to Palos Verdes and had four kids (1 girl, 3 boys), and the Osbornes moved to Long Beach and had three kids (3 girls). Imagine…. between about 1953 and 1965, those three young couples gave birth to 13 kids! Imagine, too, that this was the start of a lifelong relationship, not just between the adults, but between those kids.

Today, the friendship exists mostly between the nine girls (Karen, Lundee, Lauren, Kari, Betsy, Leslie, Vicki, Lisa, Anne, in that order). The four boys (Jay, Chris, Matt and Fritz) are there but very peripheral.

Fred, Ed, John, Betty, Ina, and Bev (in that order) have all passed away, but I think they’d be over the moon to know the kids are still hanging in.

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The above picture was taken a couple of weeks ago at Karen’s 70th birthday. She’s the first to hit the big seven – oh, and her sisters celebrated her by gathering in Reno. The came from Oregon, Colorado, MIchigan and Norway! It was a sisters-only-no-spouses-or-Peterson-or-Osbornes affair (except Art lives there, so he was around a bit), but the rest of us were all kept apprised of their week of antics. And they do do antics!

Sisters pictured, left to right: Karen, Lisa, Vicki, Lauren and Leslie. A unique and amazing bunch.